Tired Tropes in Menage M/F/M

I've seen quite a few "I slept with one guy. A few days later I slept with another guy and found out they were friends. And since everyone's OK with it let's make a relationship."

The f/m/m stories I've read have almost all been fantasy or science fiction novels, so maybe they have different tropes, as the only one I've seen is that the woman needs the men to protect her from some bad guy who is hunting her.

Tropes I've seen (not necessarily tired):

- The two men are either like shieldbrothers or rivals. It's significantly less common for one to be the leader and the other the sidekick. It's very rare for them to be lovers (which I personally would prefer).

- Men are sharing a woman because the females of their own species/tribe/clan/etc. were exterminated or they naturally produce an unbalancedly high proportion of boy babies (mars needs women)

- The woman is an 'alpha female', who biologically 'deserves' or needs a male harem. Or she is otherwise marked as special by destiny or magic, and it's important that she pass her genes on to lots of children.

- The men come from a culture where jealousy doesn't exist, or a matriarchal culture where it's normal for men to worship and serve a queen

I've seen quite a few "brothers both love a single girl" story.

It's not tired, though.

It's just hot.

The two MFMs I've written don't fit any of the tropes above.

In the first one, the heroine is in a committed relationship with Hero 1. She reconnects with an old lover, Hero 2, and realizes she still has feelings for him. When she admits this to H1, he tells her he's okay if she explores those feelings, not expecting it to actually go anywhere. Eventually, it becomes clear to all three of them that Heroine is in love with both guys, and since they're both in love with her, they agree to work things out so they can both be in her life. (I got praise from a few reviewers for presenting a less glossy, messier view of polyamorous relationships.)

In the second, the heroine reconnects with the two men she fell for in high school. Back then, she couldn't have both of them, so she chose neither. Now, the men are willing to try both being with her.

I prefer MM/F, but these are harder to find than MFM. I wish there were more of them! And not the kind where the characters fall into bed together the first night. I like a slow burn! Again, very hard to find. I like a build-up. And yes, the brothers with a single girl is a very common theme.

I'm also pretty sure I didn't come up with "Guy finds his woman with his best friend, menage ensues".

Pisco, the first one I mentioned (that got the great reviews) is out of print right now; I'm reworking it to submit to a different publisher. But if you'd like to check out the originally published version, PM me. The other one just came out in December from Ellora's Cave.

I personally know people who are involved in polyamorous relationships, and I spoke with them fairly extensively before writing the first book. I tend to twist tropes inside out and drop them on their ears, so I didn't want to write a menage that was all "Oooh, sexy, threesome yay!" My brain doesn't work that way. LOL

That said, and in reference to the thread title... Even "tired" tropes can be made fresh again if approached right. A trope might have been used in a thousand different books, but it hasn't been used by YOU yet, if that makes sense. Just like it's said there are no truly original ideas in the world, just original ways to present them. I think the same is true of tropes.

I've only written two menages, so I'm still learning the ropes. In the first, I admit to the "two men protect the woman from bad guys" trope. The twist here was, the men were a vampire and his human lover. The human man and the woman end up sharing the vampire. In the other, a woman buys two men at the local slave market for "companionship." It should have been listed as FMM but the publisher doesn't have that category. The men still had to rescue her, but she led the retaliatory assault against the bad guy. (One of the men was a horse shapeshifter, so she rode him into battle. With a sword, no less.)

What I really wish I could find more of is 3-sexed species where two of the sexes happen to be presented as 'male'. A triad would thus be the normal or ideal family for this species, and any children would be the children of all three characters.

I'm sure they're out there. You may have to write it (pretty please)?

The closest & best that I've seen so far is actually an Avengers fan fiction WIP called 'Born From The Earth' from a writer called Venusm. It's alpha/beta/omega stuff, but the worldbuilding is magnificent.

Filigree said:

I'm sure they're out there. You may have to write it (pretty please)?

The closest & best that I've seen so far is actually an Avengers fan fiction WIP called 'Born From The Earth' from a writer called Venusm. It's alpha/beta/omega stuff, but the worldbuilding is magnificent.

Click to expand...

Oh, I've actually read that one. Although a little on the dark side for me, magnificent is really the right word. Though it doesn't actually fulfill the requirement of all 3 sexes being necessary to reproduction. Omegaverse fiction is typically about alpha/omega main character pairs, with some beta/beta background character pairs. The most common version of omegaverse reproductive biology says that omega males, omega females, and beta females are the ones capable of getting pregnant, while beta males, alpha males, and alpha females are capable of doing the impregnating; I'm not sure I've seen a single omegaverse story where reproduction involved more than two people.

Glad to hear that you'd like to read this type of thing too. I don't think I could be the one writing it though - I barely write at all anymore. As much research as I've tried to do into the subject, I've just never gotten a good grasp on coming up with a coherent plot, or telling a story with an actual beginning, middle, and ending.

This is starting to sound like the Alien Nation TV show from the '90s. The couple needed a specialized male to fertilize the woman, then her mate would impregnate her.

Then after a few months, she'd transfer the fetus to her husband's pouch (a la sea horses) and he'd carry the baby to term and give birth. Let's see that in a ménage novel.

I was thinking of Alien Nation, too.

There was also an SF paperback from the mid-nineties called Mohave Wells, with an alien species where the female chose an alpha male and a beta male for dream-sex (procreative sex was in reality, and rare; they merged minds in dream for fun). Good book, if I remember it rightly.

Not a "tired" trope, but common one:

2 guys are really good friends (or connected in some way, but not sexually). They meet a girl. They fall for the same girl. = MFM

I've read paranormal, sci-fi, and BDSM variants of this, but it essentially boils down to that relationship arc. With shifter romances, you get either she's somehow the "mate" of two wolves at the same time, or she's one person's mate but is in love with the other guys as well. Sci-fi you get the "it's acceptable for xyz alien race to have a menage." BDSM, you get two Doms--one sub, and the two Doms are used to sharing subs.