There’s nothing I relish more than a truly epic love story. But what separates a deeply satisfying, feel-it-in-your-soul kind of love story from a run-of-the-mill romance that leaves you wanting more? I recently re-read some of my favorite love stories, looking for clues as to what made them so satisfying. They have wildly different characters, settings, and literary styles, but they all have three essential elements in common:
- A spark at first sight: When they look into each other’s eyes for the first time, there is an inexplicable but undeniable connection that both characters feel deeply—whether they admit it or not.
- An impossible love: I don’t want lovers who make sense. I want lovers who are torn apart by forces beyond their control and have to fight like hell to be—and stay—together.
- Emotional equality: Romeo and Juliet falls flat if Romeo is head over heels but Juliet is kind of meh. Both hearts must be equally lost to each other.
Happily, there are truckloads of epic love stories that include these essential elements. Here are my top 10.
10. The Princess Bride by William Goldman (novel)
Buttercup is the most beautiful woman in the world. Wesley is a poor farm boy. When they fall hopelessly in love, Wesley seeks his fortune at sea to earn enough money for marriage. Buttercup soon gets word that Wesley’s ship was attacked by pirates and he was killed, and she swears she’ll never love again. Five years later, Buttercup is kidnapped then rescued by a mysterious masked man who schools her on the nature of love. When Buttercup tells her rescuer that her true love was killed by pirates, he says: “Death cannot stop true love.” (Spoiler: it couldn’t stop Wesley — who’s actually still alive — from finding Buttercup, either!)
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9. The Firebird by Susanna Kearsley (novel)
Nicola was born with unusual gifts. She can read others’ thoughts, and when she holds an object, she can intuit the object’s history, including details about its past owners. But Nicola’s gifts frighten her and she tries to keep them hidden—especially after she meets Robbie, a man who can also read minds. When Robbie suddenly ‘shows up’ in Nicola’s thoughts, accidentally reading her mind from another part of the country, it’s obvious he can’t stop thinking of her. When the two join forces to track down a mysterious wood carving said to have belonged to Empress Catherine of Russia, Nicola must learn to embrace her abilities—it’s the only way she can embrace Robbie, too. This book has a great mix of passion and tenderness, plus lovers who bring out the best in each other.
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8. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
Kathy H. and Tommy D. are students at Hailsham, an English boarding school where the children have “guardians” instead of parents and where rumors about the mysterious outside world abound. Tommy is prone to embarrassing fits of rage, and when Kathy defends him against a group of bullies, they form a deep friendship. Enter their friend Ruth, who is jealous of their connection and, once they’re teens, decides to make Tommy her boyfriend so Kathy can’t have him. But nothing can shake the tender bond between Kathy and Tommy, who secretly pine for each other and only admit their true feelings when it’s almost too late.
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7. Mikhail and Margarita by Julie Lekstrom Himes
It’s 1933, and the literary elite of Moscow are under surveillance by the Soviet regime. Against a backdrop of fear and oppression, Mikhail Bulgakov (real-life author of The Master and Margarita) falls in love with a dangerous woman whose outspokenness puts her life, and the life of the men who love her, in peril. From the big city to the Gulags of Siberia, Bulgakov follows Margarita, hoping to save her so they can be together. But in a world where no one can be trusted, Bulgakov will have to choose: reunite with the woman he loves or save her life only to never see her again.
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6. The Foreign Student by Susan Choi (novel)
Seemingly different worlds collide when Chuck Anh, an exchange student from Korea, moves to 1950s Sewanee to study at The University of the South. With only a rudimentary grasp of English, Chuck meets Katherine Monroe, a 28-year-old living in her parents’ summer home on campus. The two form a friendship that deepens as they learn about each other’s secret traumas. The romance between Chuck and Katherine is a slow, simmering burn—I wanted them to get together so bad, but it seemed so impossible—until a stolen $100 bill and a one-way train ticket changes everything.
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5. The Lover by Marguerite Duras (memoir)
In a memoir that some call highly fictionalized, a French teen living in Indochina in 1929 begins an affair with the much-older son of a wealthy Chinese merchant. Their relationship is illicit on many levels—the age difference, racial divide, and class dichotomy between them make a future together impossible. While both are aware of the star-crossed nature of their relationship, the man professes to love the girl, while she claims to feel nothing for him and only be interested in sex. It’s only when she boards a steamer ship for France and realizes she’ll never see him again that her true feelings crash down on her—the relationship had never been merely physical, and she was just as in love with him as he was with her. Sweetly sad and disturbing, The Lover beautifully captures the agony of an ill-fated first love.
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4. Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx (short story)
Ennis and Jack are two young cowboys who find work herding sheep on Brokeback Mountain in Wyoming in the summer of 1963. Against a backdrop of toxic masculinity, where being gay is considered a crime worth killing for, the two men fall deeply and unexpectedly in love. But Ennis’s fear and shame prevents him from building a life with Jack, and over the course of two decades, both men marry women, have children, and only see each other during infrequent “fishing trips” on Brokeback. Their ongoing love becomes more and more heart-wrenching as the years pass and Ennis grapples with the enormity of his love for Jack and the shame he just can’t shake.
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3. This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone (novel)
In a world where it’s possible to manipulate the past and future by traveling to different ‘threads’ in time, Red and Blue are enemy agents helping their respective governments wage war on each other. Their goal is to kill each other, or at the very least, undo each other’s hostile actions, until Blue decides to write Red an illicit letter. At great personal risk—their governments can read their minds—the two begin a secret correspondence that stretches across centuries. What grows between them skirts a line between true love and total betrayal and keeps us guessing until the last delectable page.
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2. Song for Achilles by Madeleine Miller
Everyone loves Achilles, but Achilles loves Patroclus. The tenderness between the two young men makes their first moments of intimacy unexpectedly heart-warming—instead of a display of raging hormones, we see their vulnerability, insecurities, and emotional longing for each other. The consummation of their love is a deeply romantic act that binds them together for the rest of the story and beyond. And while Achilles is fated to die in battle, his love and loyalty to Patroclus is just as intrinsic to his legacy. This is a great example of lovers who are doomed from the start but whose love is strong enough to defy any obstacle—even death.
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1. Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel (novel)
Against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution, this sensual saga features one of the most passionate love stories I’ve read. 15-year-old Tita falls in love with Pedro at first sight. But when Pedro asks for her hand, Tita’s mother refuses the match—as the youngest daughter in the family, Tita can’t marry because she’s destined to take care of her mother in her old age. Desperate to be close to Tita any way he can, Pedro marries her sister instead (!) so he can live in the same house as Tita. The lovers coexist for decades without consummating their love, their feelings only growing stronger as the years go by. When Tita’s sister and mother finally pass away and she and Pedro can be together at long last, the passion is so intense that hearts are set on fire—literally.
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Rebecca Anne Nguyen is the author of The 23rd Hero, a 2024 Readers’ Choice Award winner for Best Adult Novel (Bronze).
The 23rd Hero by Rebecca Anne Nguyen
In a world overtaken by climate change, a time travel agency called the Program sends Heroes back in time to prevent environmental disasters. Sloane Burrows, who has a super memory, longs to be a Hero despite her father’s disapproval. Her life is upended when Bastian, a man from her recurring dream, appears in reality, urging her to join the Program and use her memory to save the world.
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