Mutual pining.
Romance.
Angst.
These ingredients come together to make a delicious love story. And while these can be part of any requited love story, they are essential in the #idiotsinlove style of romance.
But what is #idiotsinlove?
Idiots in love is a romance writing trope. It is immensely popular on Ao3 and other reading websites. At its core it is about two people who love each other but are being stupid in their pining and admission of their feelings.
Sounds simple, doesn’t it?
But it can be difficult to write the sweet mixture of cuteness and angst that is characteristic of such stories. They are essential fluff works, and thus the angst should not be the highlight.
Anjali, if two people who are in love can’t be together, then wouldn’t there be angst?
Of course, but that is what makes #idiotsinlove special.
The very things that could lead to angst and mutual pining, instead lead to the reader being fondly exasperated with the lovers. It is, as I have said, cute, and very sweet.
So, how do we write it?
Well, I will not be going into a step-by-step breakdown of all the stages of writing a romance in this blog. For that you can check out my pieces on Best-Friends to Lovers or Enemies-to Lovers. No, I will instead focus on two particular stages in the romance writing journey. Writing the denial of love and admissions of feelings stages.
Writing #idiotsinlove
The thing about writing a idiots-in-love romance is that this trope can enter your story after one or all the characters realise their feelings and try to dismiss them. Or it can enter before the characters even know what they are feeling.
Let us examine each scenario.
#idiotsinlove Before the Characters Realise What They Are Feeling
This “stage” in the idiots-in-love style of romance falls between the “falling in love” and “denial of attraction” parts of a typical romance. The characters know not what they are feeling but they start behaving differently around each other. While this can be perplexing for them, it gives the readers ample joy. They can not only see the characters falling in love, but also watch them figure out how to move in that love. It is a sweet stage, characterized by endearing confusion on the parts of the characters.
An example that we can look at is Percy and Annabeth from Percy Jackson and the Olympians, specifically in The Titan’s Curse. Without knowing why, Annabeth is feeling jealous of Rachel, which gives the audience who has been watching the relationship develop from friendship to romance, the signal that the character is starting to have romantic feelings for Percy.
Note- This is different from simple attraction. This kind of mutual pining has emotional elements in it.
But what about characters who have realised their feelings? Can you still have an idiots-in-love romance with that?
#idiotsinlove and Denial of Feelings
As we have established in our previous romance blogs, after the falling in love and realising of attraction, comes a denial of feelings. While the characters may become aware of their feelings, they will deny it. They can become aware by themselves or others can point it out.
And in such cases, writing idiots-in-love, is simply writing a cuter version of the “denial of attraction” stage in a romance. The characters both need to have mutual feelings and we need to see each denying it with reasons that are surface-level and seem almost childish to the readers. While yes, there can be serious reasons which have them denying their feelings, the first is more common in these types of romances.
The dynamic essential should be both characters love or like each other but are refusing to acknowledge that the other can see them in that way.
It creates for a humorous situation instead of deep angst, despite the core reason that the characters are often denying other feelings are self-esteem issues or an inability to move from friendship to romance due to being not knowing how to approach the situation. Or if you are writing a Bagginshield romance, it could be the cultural differences in how Hobbits and Dwarrow communicate love. Yes, shocker, miscommunication when used right can actually be a useful trope. Except we often use it in ways that’s plain annoying…. but that’s a topic for another blog.
For now, let’s focus on our idiots-in-love and what happens when the characters confess their feelings to themselves while still denying the others’ mutual attraction towards them?
Well, they could act on the sexual aspects or try to distance the other. But it is more enjoyable, in my opinion, to have them tip-top and fumble around each other, in friendship, while simultaneously denying the others’ feelings and trying to act on their own subconsciously or nervously when encouraged by others or unable to help themselves.
Just remember to keep it respectful.
But this dancing around each other cannot be our lovers’ perpetual state.
Eventual, they act on their feels. They confess. They kiss.
And the readers eat it up.
#idiotsinlove and Confession of Feelings
See, the thing is this. While you certainly can write an idiots-in-love romance that doesn’t have the characters become mutually involved, readers go to this sort of a fluff story for its eventual happy ending. It is the way the lovers get to that, the shenanigans, that are entertaining.
But if you were to write a tragedy, the more logical route with two people who love each other rejecting it other, will be external circumstances. The feelings are there but they cannot be acted upon. Perhaps, because the characters are on different sides of a war. Or they love one another but see the world very differently.
But who writes an idiots-in-love like that?
Let’s talk about the more common approach taken when writing this style of romance.
Happy endings.
The characters continue their endearing shenanigans and eventually come together and accept their own feelings and that the other loves them. Usually, it means acknowledging their own feelings and acceptance of the other’s ability to love them as they are.
This did not happen in the case of Percy and Annabeth, because their tiptoeing around one another was their established friendship and a confusion on how to progress further in uncertain times. Yet, they did flirt a lot and eventually when things settled accepted their love. And that puts them firmly in this category of romance.
But what other characters fit?
Let’s look at Rumbelle in Season 1 of Disney’s Once Upon a Time.
Rumpel cannot accept that Belle could love him and so he tests it, despite her being open with her affection. It makes the viewers shake their head and sigh at the obliviousness of the character but makes their eventual acceptance of each other all the more satisfying.
I mean, man had to take several other seasons to get over his self-esteem issues fully but accepting he was worthy of love and that someone like Belle could love him, was definitely progress.
And of course, you can still have an idiots-in-love dynamic after the confession. The shenanigans can continue but now it’s more awkward but sweet shows of endearing romance rather than avoidance of feelings. Percy and Annabeth again are the prime example.
See, as long as your characters are dorks who are head over heels for one another, you have an #idiotsinlove tag for your story. Or as Ragsweas, author of When the Sun Rises, I Will on Archive of Our Own says, “It is idiots-in-love, if the idiots love everyone but themselves.”
So there, you have it folks. Idiots-in-love.
What do you think? Did this blog help?
And which romance trope should I cover next? Let me know in the comments!
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Updated- 16/05/2024
