Enemies to lovers books: 14 picks, from Austen to open door

Enemies to lovers books run on a simple promise: two people who cannot stand each other will, eventually and against their better judgment, stop being able to stand being apart. It is one of the oldest shapes in fiction and one of the most searched tropes on BookTok, and it covers a remarkable range, from Regency drawing rooms to dragon academies to two executive assistants glaring across a shared office.

That range is the problem. Search for a list and you will get classics mixed with explicit adult romance and young adult fantasy, with no way to tell which is which. This guide sorts the picks by flavor, then gives a short spice guide and a map for choosing. If you already know you want magic, our guide to romantasy books goes deeper, and if you want the trope with real danger in it, start with our guide to dark romance books.

What enemies to lovers means

In an enemies to lovers story, the two leads begin in opposition. Sometimes they are literal enemies, on different sides of a war or a family feud. More often they are rivals: competing for the same job, the same prize, the same moral high ground. The romance is the story of that opposition turning into attraction, then into trust, and finally into love.

Rivals to lovers is the lighter, more competitive cousin, and forced proximity or fake dating often keep the enemies in the same room long enough for something to change. The common thread is friction, slowly turning into heat.

Why it works, and what separates good from bad

Readers love the trope because the arguing is a form of attention. Two people who fight constantly have been studying each other closely, and the moment one of them reveals how much they noticed is often the best scene in the book. But the trope is easy to do badly. The strongest examples share four things:

• A real conflict. The leads disagree about something that matters: values, loyalty, a job, a cause. A misunderstanding that one honest conversation would fix is not enmity, it is a delay.
• An earned turn. The shift from hate to love happens because of something one of them sees or does, not because the plot needs it to happen on page two hundred.
• Banter with an edge. The dialogue is sharp and funny, and both people give as good as they get. If one lead is only cruel and the other only takes it, the balance is gone.
• Both of them change. Each lead has to give up a little pride. The classic model is Austen’s, where both the proud one and the prejudiced one are wrong about something.

When it works, you finish convinced that nobody else could have kept up with either of them.

Classic enemies to lovers books

The trope is centuries old, and the classics are still the clearest examples of it. All three of these are closed door: the heat lives entirely in the conversation.

1. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen

Elizabeth Bennet overhears Mr. Darcy dismiss her at a country ball, and she decides, with considerable satisfaction, to dislike him for the rest of her life. He decides, against his own wishes, that he cannot stop thinking about her. Why it is the template: each is wrong about the other, and both have to swallow their pride to fix it. Heat: closed door, all tension.

2. Much Ado About Nothing, by William Shakespeare

Beatrice and Benedick have been trading insults for years, and their friends decide to trick each of them into believing the other is secretly in love. Why it belongs here: it is the original banter romance, two of the sharpest tongues in English literature finally turned toward each other. Heat: closed door.

3. North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell

Margaret Hale moves from the green south of England to an industrial northern mill town, where she clashes with the mill owner John Thornton over how he treats his workers. Why it belongs here: the conflict is about values, class and labor, not a misunderstanding, and both leads change because of it. Heat: closed door, with one of the great slow burns of the period.

Contemporary and rom-com rivals

This is where most readers searching for enemies to lovers books with good banter end up. Workplace and academic rivals dominate the shelf, and the stakes are usually a promotion, a grant or someone’s pride. All five are adult romance.

4. The Hating Game, by Sally Thorne

Lucy and Joshua are executive assistants to the two co-CEOs of a merged publishing company, they sit across from each other all day, and they despise each other. Then a promotion opens up, and they are both going for it. Why it is a favorite: the office games are petty in the most entertaining way, and the reveal of how much attention he has been paying is the trope at its best. Heat: moderate, with a few open-door scenes.

5. Beach Read, by Emily Henry

January writes romance. Augustus writes serious literary fiction. They were rivals in college, and now both are stuck on their next book and living in neighboring lake houses for the summer, so they make a bet: each will write a book in the other’s genre. Why it belongs here: two writers with opposite views of what stories are for, and a rivalry that slowly becomes a conversation. Heat: moderate, with some open-door scenes, and more grief than the title suggests.

6. Love on the Brain, by Ali Hazelwood

Bee, a neuroscientist, gets the chance to co-lead a NASA research project, and then learns her co-lead is Levi, her nemesis from graduate school, who has apparently hated her for years. Why it belongs here: academic rivals are a whole subgenre of their own, and Hazelwood made it popular, with a heroine who is very funny about being very stressed. Heat: open door, moderate to high.

7. The Spanish Love Deception, by Elena Armas

Catalina needs a date for her sister’s wedding in Spain, and the only person who volunteers is Aaron, the coworker she cannot stand. Why it belongs here: it combines rivals with fake dating, two tropes that fit together naturally, and the slow burn is very slow. Heat: a long slow burn, then open door.

8. Twisted Hate, by Ana Huang

Jules and Josh have disliked each other from the start, and then they agree to a no-strings arrangement that keeps getting more complicated. It is the third book of the Twisted series but reads on its own. Why it belongs here: it is the most-searched answer to enemies to lovers with spice, and the bickering never really stops. Heat: high, with explicit scenes.

Fantasy enemies to lovers books

Fantasy gives the trope its highest stakes, because the leads can be on opposite sides of an actual war. Both picks here are young adult, which makes them good starting points for teen readers. Our romantasy guide covers the adult side, including two of the books most often named for this trope: Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros, where Violet and Xaden have every reason to want each other dead, and The Cruel Prince by Holly Black, where Jude and Cardan’s mutual loathing is the engine of a whole trilogy.

9. Serpent & Dove, by Shelby Mahurin (YA)

Lou is a witch hiding in a city that burns witches. Reid is a witch hunter sworn to that cause. A scandal forces them to marry. Why it belongs here: the enmity is built into who they are, and neither can simply decide to stop being it. Heat: on the steamier side of young adult, nothing explicit.

10. The Wrath and the Dawn, by Renée Ahdieh (YA)

A retelling of One Thousand and One Nights. A young caliph takes a new bride every night and has her killed at dawn, and Shahrzad volunteers to marry him in order to avenge her friend. Why it belongs here: she enters the marriage planning to destroy him, and the story is the slow discovery of why he does what he does. Heat: low, closed door.

Darker enemies to lovers

At the darker end, the enmity is not playful, and the line between rivalry and cruelty gets thin. These books are for adults who know they want that. Our dark romance guide covers the genre in full, including Corrupt by Penelope Douglas, a revenge-driven enemies to lovers story that many readers start with.

11. Bully, by Penelope Douglas

Tate comes home after a year abroad to face Jared, the boy next door who used to be her best friend and spent the years before she left making her life miserable. This time she is not going to take it. Why it belongs here: it is the bully romance that defined a whole corner of the trope, and the question of whether he deserves forgiveness is the point. It is new adult, not young adult. Heat: high, explicit, with bullying themes throughout.

LGBTQ+ enemies to lovers books

Queer romance has some of the best rivalries on the shelf, from royal feuds to locker rooms to a magical boarding school.

12. Red, White & Royal Blue, by Casey McQuiston

Alex, the son of the American president, and Henry, a British prince, have a long-running feud that turns into a public disaster at a royal wedding. To repair the damage, they are made to pretend to be friends. Why it belongs here: a political rivalry, a fake friendship, and two very different people who keep surprising each other. Heat: moderate, some on-page scenes.

13. Heated Rivalry, by Rachel Reid

Shane and Ilya are star hockey players on rival teams, and they keep a secret relationship going for years while competing against each other in public. Why it belongs here: the rivalry is real and professional, and the slow shift from secret arrangement to something neither can deny is the heart of it. Heat: high, explicit.

14. Carry On, by Rainbow Rowell (YA)

Simon Snow is the chosen one at a school of magic, and his roommate Baz, a vampire, has been his sworn enemy for years. In their final year, Baz does not turn up, and Simon cannot stop thinking about why. Why it belongs here: it is an affectionate send-up of the chosen-one story and a sincere enemies to lovers romance at the same time. Heat: low, closed door.

A quick spice guide: closed door to explicit

Many searches for this trope come with a heat level attached, with spice or without spice, clean or closed door. Here is the plain version:

• Closed door. Intimacy happens off the page, if at all. Pride and Prejudice, Much Ado About Nothing, North and South, The Wrath and the Dawn and Carry On.
• Warm. Some on-page scenes, not the focus. The Hating Game, Beach Read, Red, White & Royal Blue, and Serpent & Dove at the young adult level.
• Open door. Explicit scenes are part of the story. Love on the Brain and The Spanish Love Deception.
• High spice. Explicit and frequent. Twisted Hate, Heated Rivalry and Bully.

On age range: the books marked YA above were published for teen readers and are good choices for a teenager searching for enemies to lovers books. Everything else on this list is written for adults, and the darker picks especially are not meant for younger readers. And heat is not darkness: Twisted Hate is explicit but light in tone, while Bully is both.

How to choose your next enemies to lovers book

Match the book to what you want from the trope:

• If you want the classic, start with Pride and Prejudice, then North and South for something with more weight.
• If you want banter and a rom-com, The Hating Game is the standard. Beach Read adds more feeling.
• If you want academic or workplace rivals, Love on the Brain for the lab, The Hating Game for the office.
• If you want enemies to lovers with spice, Twisted Hate or Heated Rivalry.
• If you want it clean, stay with the classics, or try The Wrath and the Dawn.
• If you want fantasy, Serpent & Dove for young adult, then the romantasy guide for adult picks.
• If you want it dark, Bully, then the dark romance guide.
• If you want LGBTQ+, Red, White & Royal Blue for a rom-com, Heated Rivalry for heat, Carry On for magic.

An enemies to lovers story written for you

The hardest thing about this trope is timing. Every reader has a different idea of how long the sparring should last and which moment should finally break it, and in a published book that moment belongs to the author. StoryStepper works differently. It is a private reading app, on the web, for adults 18 and over, that writes fiction for one reader using AI guided by a set of editorial rules. It is AI-written, and we would rather say so plainly.

Contemporary romance is one of its six genres, along with dark romance, revenge drama, gothic mystery, fantasy and historical. Before chapter one, you answer a short set of questions: who your lead is, who they are at heart, and the central tension of the story. Write "enemies to lovers" into your premise and the story is built around it. You also set hard lines. You can leave out explicit sexual content, graphic violence or infidelity, or hold nothing back, so the same rivalry can be closed door or open door depending on what you choose. Here is every question onboarding asks.

In the Stories plan, a new chapter arrives every morning and ends with exactly two choices, and the next chapter is written from the one you make, across up to 21 chapters in three seasons of seven. That is the trope’s best moment handed to you: you decide whether to throw the next barb or let the silence go on a beat too long. The first two chapters are free. If you would rather read the whole thing at once, the Books plan writes a complete, non-branching short novel from your idea, ready within the hour.

For a taste of the tone, read a sample opening. In The Plus-One Clause, a pastry chef comes home at two in the morning to find a note on his door from the upstairs neighbor he has never met: a request for a fake boyfriend, Saturday only. In Clause Eleven, a printer’s daughter in Regency Bath offers a stranger a marriage of convenience on strict terms, and he finds the one clause she was not sure of. Neither starts as open warfare, but both start with two people negotiating very hard.

Whichever book you pick up next, the best enemies to lovers story is the one where you believe the fight, and believe the moment it stops even more.