Crooked smiles and other weirdly specific YA cliches

kindratiah

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So, I was writing my main love interest and I caught myself mentioning his crooked smile an awful lot.

Then I noticed it. In every single YA book I touched, the main love interest had an endearingly crooked smile. I'm curious why this is. Is this something a bunch of us just happen to find strangely attractive? Is it the roguishness? Is it a trend that began with Stephanie Meyer, like so many other popular tropes in YA?

Anyway, just curious about what other strangely specific YA tropes and cliches you guys have come across, particularly the ones you found yourself inadvertently writing into your own works.
 
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I haven’t noticed crooked smiles, myself. But, omg, the bitten lips. It’s a wonder that YA heroines can give any kind of smile. Or talk. or eat. But authors figured out they were overusing them, so eventually in a book that uses a bunch, they’ll elevate it to biting so hard that they draw blood. But that’s not where it ends. To avoid biting lips, they’ll chew on them. Or bite their cheeks. Or chew on their cheeks. Until they draw blood. Or maybe their tongues, if lips or cheeks seem stale.

2/3 books I’ve read this year have ended up on my “lip bite” shelf. That doesn’t tell you how many were multiple bites in one book
 

Kjbartolotta

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I always assumed it started with Stephanie Meyer, recall the crooked smiles from a few years ago but nothing recently.

Current weirdly specific YA trend, books with crowns on the cover. Too tired to cite examples, but prod me and I will...
 

MaeZe

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I don't recall the crooked smile from Twilight either, but the lip biting and the guy moving a strand of the gal's hair behind her ear, I vow not to use those in my book. :tongue
 

Writingthewords

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I have noticed the crooked smile and the lip bitting. Also, the slanted gaze—I believe it's used instead of the mysterious gaze. What I do find myself writing a lot is about mysterious eyes (be it the color or the enthralling allure) but I can't seem to stop.
 

frimble3

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And yet, I've never read "Her eyes were mysterious - the left one wandered, so you were never quite sure what she was really looking at."
 

gckatz

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Letting out a breath she didn't know she was holding. It's the Wilhelm Scream of YA at this point.
 

RolandWrites

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I find myself writing crooked smiles because I'm attracted to them, so more characters of mine have them than they should because I love them, not because I notice them in other books. Lip biting it a huge trend and I have to pay attention to doing it in my own books because I have OCD and I compulsively lip and cheek bite, and sometimes I write that trait into my characters too much.

Holding a breath she didn't know she was holding -- I hate that line so much. Every time I see it in a client's book, I have to comment on it. How do you not know you're holding your breath?

Boys kissing girls to shut them up when they're upset -- I see this way more than I would like.


"I'm so plain how could anyone ever like me" -- this sort of attitude by female characters ever since twilight. :gaah

Those are the ones I've noticed in the YA I read (YA isn't the genre I read the most, but I do read it).
 

The Second Moon

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"I'm so plain how could anyone ever like me"

I have noticed that, and still may, have done something like that, but she thinks she's ugly not plain. But I think, now that I look back at it, that I may have added a twist. The girl can turn into a human-sized pink frog-gecko form and she only thinks that form is ugly. She's fine with her human form. Yet, it is still a little cliche. I made it so the boy told her she was pretty and cool and now she's fine with her frog-gecko form. Oops.
 

Layla Nahar

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There are a good number of people who are attractive though not conventionally so and think of themselves as ugly.
 

shadowsminder

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I'd figured that started with Han Solo a long, long time ago.

I'm not especially well read in YA yet, so I'm not certain about tropes. The moody, roguish love interest who's mean to the hero for her own good seems to be one. Maybe that explains the crooked smile?
 

Tazlima

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It only just occurred to me... I'm not sure I know what a crooked smile actually is. Is it a half-smile? Is it a sincere, beaming smile that's just lopsided?

I don't recall ever hearing any other body part described as "crooked" in such a way that it's meant to be charming and endearing. Nobody writes about "cute, crooked teeth," (although I DID have a friend growing up who had a slight case of buckteeth that was absolutely adorable. I was super jealous of them) or "the most darling little crooked back."
 

Kjbartolotta

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Does anyone remember when there was a trend towards male love interests having full back tattoos? Obviously Tris is the king of that, I recall seeing a lot of galleys trying to do the Tortured Tatted Badboy thing.

Also, sexy dark angelboys. We're like eight years out from that trend, but I badly want someone to bring it back for spleen fascination reasons. *Eyes NanoWriMo This Year*
 

kindratiah

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I find myself writing crooked smiles because I'm attracted to them, so more characters of mine have them than they should because I love them, not because I notice them in other books. Lip biting it a huge trend and I have to pay attention to doing it in my own books because I have OCD and I compulsively lip and cheek bite, and sometimes I write that trait into my characters too much.

Holding a breath she didn't know she was holding -- I hate that line so much. Every time I see it in a client's book, I have to comment on it. How do you not know you're holding your breath?

Boys kissing girls to shut them up when they're upset -- I see this way more than I would like.


"I'm so plain how could anyone ever like me" -- this sort of attitude by female characters ever since twilight. :gaah

Those are the ones I've noticed in the YA I read (YA isn't the genre I read the most, but I do read it).

I also started writing the crooked smile thing because I love it and find it attractive. Then, I started reading and re-reading a bunch of YA, since I was writing in the age-group, and noticed the trend.

I ended up deciding to describe the character's smile as "shark-like" instead, as it gets across more of how I want him to feel and is less about just making him seem roguishly hot. Although he's not bad-looking, there's something disturbing about his appearance that people kinda have to get past and get used to as they get to know him, and I feel like that comes across a bit better now.

I've also decided to have my main character really quite like how she looks, even though there are some things about her that aren't considered conventionally attractive. She even acquires a number of crater-like scars near the beginning of the book that she later fills with little gems in order to draw even more attention to them. (scars are totally a cliche/trope as well...and I love them.)

One of these days, I want to do a huge YA haul read and keep a tally of all the hallmark cliches as they come. I wonder how many characters just let a out a breathe they didn't know they were holding?

I definitely just wrote a lip-biting scene yesterday, by the way.
 
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Aerythia

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Maybe it's just the books I've read recently, but a lot of the impossibly hot love interests like to purr their dialogue. I mean, are all these men part feline?

"Ridiculous innuendo comment" the dark, rugged yet sensitive love interest purred.

If this is a trend, perhaps I will make my stunningly breathtaking bad boy love interest bark all his lines... surely the evolution of this idea?
 

starrystorm

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Ugh. Stop me now me now before I rant forever. No one stopped me? Okay, here I go.

Here's the scenario, male MC is in love with pretty girl, but pretty girl already has a mean jerk for a boyfriend. MC gets too close to pretty girl, and the jerk fights him. This then involves pretty girl screaming "stop it!" or "fight back!" or "I'll help!" (and then makes things worse). :e2smack: The girl does nothing. Nothing! I don't get it. I hate it. *Rants for five more hours* :Soapbox:

I can name five movies and two books off the top of my head that do this. Granted, books don't do it as often or at least change it up a bit. Still, you almost always see this cliche involving teenagers.
 

frimble3

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:e2smack: The girl does nothing. Nothing! I don't get it. I hate it. *Rants for five more hours* :Soapbox:
I could see a story where the girl doesn't do anything, because she doesn't like either guy, and it's of no interest to her who wins.
Maybe she's a princess, and they are two rival suitors. Doesn't matter who wins, :Shrug: she's got to marry one of 'em.
 

Undercover

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The strand of hair tucked behind the ear, like Maeze said. (not just with the love interest. the MCs do it to themselves a lot too)
I see it all the time.
 

RolandWrites

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It only just occurred to me... I'm not sure I know what a crooked smile actually is. Is it a half-smile? Is it a sincere, beaming smile that's just lopsided?

I have a crooked smile. When I smile, my mouth pulls much farther to the left than it does to the right, so my smile is very lopsided to the left. It makes it look like I'm mostly smiling with just the left side of my mouth, like a full, very happy smile on that side glued to a small, so-so smile on the other. So that's what my crooked smile looks like.

Oh, and @frimble3 - yes! I would love to come across a scene in one of my client's books where the book kiss's the girl to shut her up and she just bites the hell out of his lip. "Ever heard of consent? It's a thing I did not give you." And then she finds herself a love interest that treats her right.
 
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Tazlima

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I have a crooked smile. When I smile, my mouth pulls much farther to the left than it does to the right, so my smile is very lopsided to the left. It makes it look like I'm mostly smiling with just the left side of my mouth, like a full, very happy smile on that side glued to a small, so-so smile on the other. So that's what my crooked smile looks like.

Ooooh. That DOES sound cute. :)