5 Alternate Takes on YA Love Triangles

love triangles

Most of us loathe the dreaded love triangle, which appears particularly prevalent in YA fiction. Inspired by some discussions I’ve seen on Twitter this week, here are my top 5 alternate takes on a love triangle that would make it much more palatable to me!

1. The boy is the one in the middle for a change. Ah, the agony of his feels as he is forced to choose between the mysterious new girl and his attractive childhood best friend… *snorts*

2. A love triangle when one of the suitors is like “You know what? I’m out.” They get tired of being strung along, and decide that if the MC is not going to make a decision, then they’re bowing out for their own self-preservation.

3. LGBQTA protagonists in the dreaded triangle of lurve. For instance, a bi girl torn between a princess who runs a secret spy ring and a dashing knight with a tragic backstory! Yeahhhh! Authors, there’s a whole damn alphabet at your disposal.

4. A … one sided triangle? That doesn’t sound right! (Mathematically, that would just be a line!) I’m referring to instances where it’s not two people in love with the same person, but person X in love with person Y who doesn’t return X’s feelings and is actually in serious feels for person Z. Capiche?

5. And, my favourite scenario of all: the two competing dudes realize that all their posturing and growling at each other for the heroine’s attention is ACTUALLY to hide the fact that they like each other very very much so they shack up and become happy gay farmers while the heroine goes on to slay dragons and conquer the world, single and damn happy about it, thank you very much.

+ BONUS

All three of the protagonists decide to screw society’s expectations, and form a very happy, very supportive polyamorous relationship. WOOT!

What about you, lovely readers? Any other configurations you think I should have included?