This week over at the Fantasy Review Barn Nathan is once again taking us tough travelling through the tropes of fantasy.  This week’s topic is:

FORBIDDEN LOVE

Even in Fantasyland parents are not always happy with their children’s choice of partners.

Most of the romances here are not intended to be the main story – they’re all pretty much asides.  Also, there could be spoilers with some of these examples so beware.

1. Hexed (The Sisters of Witchdown) by Michael Alan Nelson – I loved this it was a really good read.  I will say this is not a romance novel!  Not at all.  But, as an aside there is a budding relationship that develops between the main character Lucifer who develops feelings for a young man accompanying her on a rescue mission.  Why is this forbidden – well the rescue mission is to recover the young man’s lady love – awkward.
2. Red Rising by Pierce Brown – in which Darrow and Mustang become involved in a relationship.  Again, this is far from the central theme of the story.  The reason it’s forbidden – Darrow and Mustang are from different ‘class’ structures all together.  Darrow is a Red, born into the mines and Mustang is a Gold, born into one of the most elite and powerful houses.  On top of this – well (spoiler alert) Darrow is all made up as a Gold – the treachery!  Doubly forbidden.
3. The Greyfriar by Clay and Susan Griffith – love in the most expected place – a vampire and a human.  Absolutely forbidden – a vampire falling in love with it’s food, tsk.
4. Angellfall by Susan Ee – Penryn and Raffe – what can I say, angels and humans – it won’t be the first time that the attraction has happened between humans and angels but, forbidden or denied or not, there is a lot of chemistry that is very readable taking place in these pages.
5. The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon – a strange world full of clairvoyants.  Paige is kidnapped and taken to ‘Oxford’ where she will become a slave to a warden, one of the Rephaim.  Mm, guess what happens next.  Well, obviously they develop feelings for each other.  Yep, didn’t see that coming!  Again though, the romance isn’t the central theme of the book and in fact book 2 actually sees the two spending very little page time together.  Of course, for the treachery and betraying their own kind both of them could be put to death.
6. Stolen Songbird by Danielle Jensen – in which Cecile only goes and falls in love with the Prince.  Wait, hold on a moment.  That sounds too good to be true.  Ahh, well, he’s a troll (not a cave troll thankfully).  And the trolls may have abducted her because they needed a human to break the curse they’ve been living under.  Yeah, not so dreamy any longer.

Finally, can we just take a minute to consider this:

No, not Fassbender, well, ,no… – Mr Rochester from Jane Eyre, okay, not a fantasy novel – but how forbidden was his love for Jane – very much so.  It’s usually frowned upon to marry, when your first wife is alive and well and living in your attic!  She was a tiny bit crazy though, so..