This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Lasell chapter.
I’m a certified romantic (whether or not I’m a hopeless one is a different question up for debate) and that means I adore anything and everything romance, especially in my favorite medias. I’m not kidding, in most of my Stardew Valley playthroughs, I get married to one of the romanceable characters before I even finish the Community Center! I’ve also always loved some romance in my books or shows, and therefore wanted to show some love for my favorite romance tropes in media!
Enemies to lovers:
Let me just clarify this right now: I think enemies to lovers works best when used in fantasy stories. I do not understand why books will be marketed using this trope just for it to be an office romance or only one person hates the other or one person merely thinks the other hates them when in actuality they never have. For this trope to work in my opinion, both people need to despise each other and make it known to the other.
I think one of the best examples of this trope done well is Jude Duarte and Cardan Greenbriar from The Cruel Prince series. Both characters legitimately hate each other and actively try to make the other’s life miserable. It’s how they slowly open up and their feelings are revealed through their words and actions that is just so perfect. I mean, I’m not sure much can top Cardan’s letter to Jude in The Queen of Nothing, “Come home and shout at me. Come home and fight with me. Come home and break my heart, if you must. Just come home.”
Friends to lovers:
I love this trope because it can do yearning so well. Yearning in any romance just adds another layer that to me is absolute perfection. It can really add depth to a character way more than when they just experience love at first sight or have instant chemistry with another character. I think friends to lovers works especially when the friendship is already built on a strong foundation of trust and respect. I think it sets up perfectly for a romance to follow and I will eat it up every time. There’s something so beautiful about characters knowing and caring about someone for so long, and then realizing they’re falling in love.
My all-time favorite example of this trope is Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase from Percy Jackson and the Olympians. We first meet these characters when they’re only twelve years old, and we get to watch their relationship grow from a friendship into arguably one of the best love stories of all time. What’s more is that these two are committed to each other and have survived some incredible things together. They will take stab wounds for each other and go through literal Hell together because it meant they would be together. My heart exploded when I first read these books in sixth grade, and it still does as a junior in college.
Fake dating:
I’m not against a little messiness in my romances, and the fake dating trope always delivers. My favorite is when it starts as a way to get revenge or to appease nosy friends or family members. It’s always hilarious when they have to come up with a backstory or act like a couple in public so their plan doesn’t get found out. I live for the part of the story when both characters realize that their relationship might be fake, but their feelings aren’t. The confession is always so so good.
The fake dating scheme in Two Wrongs Make a Right begins as a revenge scheme against mutual friends that soon turns into something more. After a disastrous first meeting, Jamie and Bea are set up by their mutual friends without their knowledge. Once they realize their friends’ meddling, Bea and Jamie decide to give their friends exactly what they want – for Bea and Jamie to be in a relationship. They manage to keep the act up for a while, but they learn more and more about each other along the way, and eventually fall in love. There’s also incredible neurodivergent and queer representation in this book, which only increases my love for it.
Serious and easy-going:
This is slightly similar to the “grumpy x sunshine” or “black cat and golden retriever” tropes that are also extremely popular, but I specifically love when one character is very serious and literal, and the other is an easy-going occasional goofball. Their dynamic can be comedic at times but also allows for moments of emotional intimacy. I’ve found that this trope is more popular in television shows, particularly among co-workers.
Speaking of which, my two favorite examples of this trope are Jake and Amy from Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Booth and Bones from Bones. Both are crime-fighting duos that don’t always get along at first due to their dynamic personalities, but through spending time with each other realize that they aren’t so different after all. They also have similar aspects to Percy and Annabeth in that they’ve saved each other’s lives at one point or another. These couples both also have men who just love and respect their partners so much, and it has set my expectations very high.
