By Mairyn Krause
Spoilers: I Temporarily Do, The Spanish Love Deception, and The Hating Game
Photo by Theo Crazzolara on Unsplash
Reading hasn’t always been the most popular hobby. However, it absolutely blew up on social media during the COVID-19 lockdown, specifically on TikTok.
If you managed to stay off TikTok for the entire time, you must have been a diehard hater. Perhaps people dancing for 30 seconds didn’t really do it for you. But if you were rotting on that funny little clock app for multiple hours a day like the rest of us, there is no way you were able to escape “BookTok.”
The way this phenomenon systematically took over my entire For You page for months is almost indescribable, and I know for a fact that I’m not the only one. It grew so quickly that before I could even blink, bookstores were adding a whole new section for the reads that BookTok had deemed popular. This gave me a bunch of books with cute romance blurbs and equally cute cartoon covers to feed my growing addiction.
The main reason I think BookTok, and subsequently reading, was able to flourish is because readers finally found romance books with tropes that they were willing to read over and over again. Of the many tropes and sub-tropes seen in contemporary romance, the three most popular right now seem to be marriage of convenience, enemies-to-lovers, and fake dating. These tropes often overlap. If you have read one, it’s likely you have read another.
Marriage of Convenience
Most marriage of convenience novels seen today are very similar. Some examples include In a Jam by Kate Canterbary, Contractual Obligations by Elle Rivers, The Wall of Winnipeg and Me by Mariana Zapata, Roomies by Christina Lauren, and I Temporarily Do by Ellie Cahill.
Usually, with marriage of convenience, one of the protagonists needs something that can only be accomplished by marriage and the other protagonist needs something that their fake partner can give. For example, in I Temporarily Do, the male protagonist’s fiancé backs out of their wedding, and so his graduate school housing falls through. Similarly, the female protagonist is conned out of her apartment and needs somewhere to live.
There is also usually a slight twist to make things fun. For example, maybe he has always been in love with her or vice versa. In the case of I Temporarily Do, the main female protagonist shares the same name as the ex-fiancé of the male protagonist. Funny how that works out!
Fake Dating
Fake dating is something that is almost always featured on BookTok. Some books with this trope include The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood, The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas, The Deal by Elle Kennedy, and The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren.
This trope is usually a mutually beneficial arrangement as well. When these couples break up, scenes tend to be on the more dramatic side due to miscommunication. This was the case with The Spanish Love Deception, when Catalina worried about judgment at her workplace due to her budding relationship with a coworker.
Enemies to Lovers
We all knew it was coming; it would be sacrilegious to write about book tropes and leave out enemies-to-lovers. It completely blew up, not only in contemporary romance, but in dark romance and fantasy as well.
Some examples include The Hating Game by Sally Thorne, Emily Henry’s Beach Read and Book Lovers, and Mariana Zapata’s Kulti and From Lukov with Love. An honorable mention is You Deserve Each Other by Sarah Hogle because the couple is already together; however, it is still one hundred percent an enemies-to-lovers book.
In enemies-to-lovers novels, the main characters aren’t usually enemies in a traditional sense. Rather, they are rivals competing for something at work or in school. Alternatively, they may have a strong dislike for each other.
In contemporary romance, this dislike is never so strong that readers can’t see the inevitable happy ending. For example, in The Hating Game, the main protagonists work in the same office space (forced proximity) and are competing for one job position. They find little ways to bug each other before inevitably fake dating and (spoiler) realizing they love each other in the end.
In The End
There are so many other great book examples not mentioned that are definitely worth a deep dive into Goodreads. These tropes are special because there are so many versions of them.
Every time, authors use their creativity to write comforting stories through familiar devices. It’s like watching your favorite movie over and over again, because there is safety in knowing that there is always a happy ending.
Mairyn Krause is a senior at Florida State University, double majoring in Editing, Writing and Media and Mass Media Studies and planning to graduate early. She works as an editorial assistant for the social media section of Kudzu. Mairyn enjoys spending time with friends and family, recreating her favorite takeout recipes, and is an avid reader who is always looking for new book recommendations.
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