Res ipsa loquitur

riverlight prompts: what tropes you love to write and any you hate!

Oh, I love tropes! They are to slash what iambic pentameter is to sonnets -- both something to give the story shape and something for it to push against and fight.

I love Aliens Made Them Do It and Sex Pollen and Forced Marriage and other tropes that take the decision out of their hands until afterwards.

I love first kisses like you wouldn't believe.

I love Hypothermia and Undercover In The Gay Nightclub and Pretend Marriage and other tropes that force them into close physical proximity.

I love Truth Serum and Vino Veritas and even the generally implausible Truth Or Dare Game, because it's incredibly sexy when people have to talk about sex and very moving when they have to talk about love, and the characters I like best usually won't do that unless you force them.

I love, love, love situations where characters have to sort of learn to have sex with each other -- for me that's the chief joy of virginity stories and of turning straight characters gay, and also of giving characters unusual sexual responses, unusual genitalia, different species, etc.

As for what I dislike --

I love yearning, but I hate it when it's all filled in with appearance-based self-hatred ("He's so handsome and I'm so ugly and boring, he could never possibly want me," etc.).

Alpha/Beta/Omega doesn't do anything for me unless I pretend it's a sex pollen story.

I'm an Episcopalian, which means I went to Sunday school with my priest's youngest daughter, which means priest AUs don't really have any visceral impact for me.

(When I look at that list, I really need to write more tropes, because they fill me with enthusiasm.)