The Tea Post 10 The Tamlin Trope
The Tamlin Trope I hate So Much
Love triangles are a widely loved or hated trope. The Tamlin trope is a variant. It happens when there is a love triangle, but the reader isn’t meant to fully know it’s there. When an author pours a great deal of time into developing a Love Interest who is all around a decent person. They often support the Protagonist—sometimes help this character become a braver person. They seem fated both by equal attachment and by fate. The story sees our two heroes face down the world for their love, and then they end up together. They beat the odds.
Buuuut.
Buuut the series must continue.
The romantic drama has to go somewhere!
The Protagonist is in love. They are loyal and happy, and they have found their other half. This will not do!
There is only one solution.
The Love Interest must become a foil. The Love Interest must, in fact, become so despicable that the Protagonist experiences all the angst of heartbreak/self-doubt/ and pain so that they must leave the Love Interest to save themselves. In short-the former decent person that was the Love Interest must make a 180 in character development and become the lowest of the low.
Often this trope is accompanied by the Bad Boy trope. A villainous (hot) character that lingered in the background (sometimes foreground) of the original romance plot also experiences a 180. But “not really.” They were actually good all along! There are explanations the Protagonist just didn’t understand that put all these terrible actions into a new light. And a new love interest.
Why Authors? Why?
Ok so S.J.M. is not the first to use this trope. She isn’t the last to use this trope. But she is the one who took it the farthest for me in her Beauty and the Beast spinoff A Court of Thorns and Roses.
Tamlin is never a rose of a human being, but for most of the novel, he isn’t an idiot. He wants to protect Fayre. She helps him become a better leader to his people. He helps her believe in herself, he values her skills and art, and she risks her life to save him and his kingdom because she believes in their love. And at the very last 1/10 of the storyline, suddenly he begins acting out of character. Suddenly he is putting her life in jeopardy to … make out?? She isn’t even in the mood. Despite his character often pushing her away (yes even sexually) to keep her safe for the majority of the novel—suddenly he is wasting time, not trying to help her escape, not trying to help her prepare to break the curse, but just, wanting to make out in dangerous situations?? And this is the only foreshadowing we get before book two where he becomes an abusive, violent control freak that locks her up, monitors her, rapes her, stops listening to her, and tries to trap her to him in marriage…despite her now being more powerful than she has ever been before. He let her risk her life as a vulnerable human but now that she is magical she can’t go for a horseback ride. Why?? …Oh, right, because there is a new love interest. And emotional drama.
This trope has been around for a while. Example: Jonathan from Tamora Pierce’s Alana series. One of my favorite characters: an honorable, open-minded prince who encourages Alana to be exactly herself even after he discovers she has lied to him and disguised herself as a boy to become a knight. He then becomes a stuck-up idiot when he asks her to marry him, give up her dreams of being a wandering knight and become a “lady.” He treats her in a demeaning way until she rejects him multiple times and he leaves in a rage-huff-tantrum so unlike his character in the past books I couldn’t recognize him. What even and why? Because Alana has slept with Jonathan and there has to be a reason outside of herself for her to move on to a different guy. (Also he can’t just move on from her himself knowing she isn’t the partner he needs. The Protagonist still has to be the most wanted after all!) And of course, for some emotional drama. Her next love interest, of course, dies so there can be a new love interest. So are we teaching girls that it’s ok to have more than one love in your life . . . but only if they die or are abusive enough to shove them out of their lives?
And this trope isn’t going away. You can read it again in the Shatter Me series by Tahereh Mafi.
There are several reasons why I hate this trope
It is often framed as a form of progressive feminism. It “encourages” young women that you don’t have to be with the first person you fall in love with. And while this sentiment is true, it is greatly undermined by the problematic aspect that the guy often becomes abusive before or when the female pushes him away. This is often done because the protagonist might be viewed as a “mean” person for falling out of love with such a great guy otherwise. Or because, you know, there really is no reason for them to fall out of love. And the protagonist would be the “cheater” in the relationship for falling in love with someone else. Not sure how anyone can be empowered by this.
I hate 180-degree character flips with no foreshadowing. Can a twist make a former likable character the villain? Absolutely! Can villains make a 180 to become the hero in a believable way? Absolutely!! Some of my absolute favorite characters are villains turned heroes. But. BUT these villains’ bad traits are never explained away. They own that they did bad things. These bad things are often the catalyst for them to make a selfless choice—sometimes these choices cost them their lives.
Can good characters become villains? Well…usually this happens with “gray” characters more. Example: Brandon Sanderson’s Warbreaker. Denth keeps telling Vivenna he isn’t a good person. The reader half believes but also doesn’t because he is so honest and the jokes are so disarming. And when the betrayal comes, all the pieces click together in a really creepy but satisfying way.
Turning a love interest evil? No one really enjoys this. It is done well In The Claidi Journals by Tanith Lee but it’s also infuriating because the reader knows the love interest is scum walking, the Protagonist half knows it too but self-deludes herself because she is so lonely.
But without a lot of solidly believable foreshadowing? …it usually doesn’t work out well. Example: Luke Skywalker. Don’t change the core of a character to be bad or mean without having a really, really good reason for it. And even Luke’s failures weren’t a good enough reason for the majority of the fan base because it went against the core of his character—hope for people who the world deems unsavable. You know . . . literally the plot of the original three movies and Luke’s entire character growth.
I find it a bit gross to use abuse to “grow” the protagonist into someone “better.” The angst makes the reader feel so bad for the protagonist. They are a victim. And they come out of it angry and stronger than ever once they “recover.” Do difficulties often make people “grow,” absolutely! But this trope often over-dwells and almost glories in the pain of the protagonist to wring those emotions and tears from its readers. Why? Because there is no other reason for the abuse to exist except to justify the Protagonist leaving the Love Interest.
If the Romantic Interest has to become a villain for the Protagonist to break up with them in order to make their former “love” stay cannon, what does that say about the protagonist and the reader for you know . . . completely missing all the red flags? We feel dumb, that’s what. We feel like we wasted our time on this love plot. Or we accept that the Author just . . . (*Whisper*) did a bad job? Or maybe worse . . . planned it this way??
Just Stop
I am looking forward to reading a YA/Teen/Juvenile romance adventure book one day in which two romantic amazing leads part as decent human beings because love sucks sometimes and first relationships aren’t always perfect—sometimes the timing is off, sometimes dreams split people in different directions, or *ouch* maybe they don’t love each other equally or enough, and that’s ok.
(And please not in the Jacob, Edward way where Jacobs not at all ok and about to murder a baby when magic “imprints” him into a questionably (creepy love story) “decent” human that can be best friends with Belle again.)
And please not in the (guess you gotta die) now dude because you aren’t Mr. Right—A.K.A The Uglies by Scott Westerfield.
Hunger Games maybe? Maaaybe? It had its own weirdnesses. Does Katniss even wanna be in love?
Maybe you’ve read it and I haven’t—in which case comment below!
