One trope I really dislike in love stories (mostly common to fanfic and romance novels but it can be found elsewhere) is when the author goes out of their way to (a) establish that a protagonist had absolutely no significant positive feelings for their previous sexual/romantic partners and (b) presents this chiefly as proof that the other protagonist is uniquely Worthy and that the main romance is True Love. This is a pretty specific scenario; I’m not talking about, say, the hero who has no romantic or sexual experience, or the heroine who married young and her husband was shitty in a specific way, or the protagonist who enjoyed their past relationships but they never totally clicked. I’m talking about “the hero has slept with so, so many women, but don’t worry! He never felt so much as slight fondness for them or admired any of their non-physical qualities. He might as well have been using a blow-up doll every time.” Or “the heroine has only ever loved the hero. She has never looked upon another man with lust in her heart. If she ever dated anyone else, she never felt affection or respect or admiration for him. This is proof of true love, not the result of dating only shitty guys or maybe being kind of a tool.” I promise, it’s not going to ruin a romance if the hero is like “my ex-girlfriend was a good person” or the heroine is like “I enjoyed having sex with the guy I dated for five years.”