The Love of My Afterlife

The Love of My Afterlife falls into the genre of contemporary romance, which is categorized by happy endings and familiar plotlines but often focuses on the main characters’ personal growth and the obstacles they must overcome to resolve their conflicts. Most contemporary romances feature flawed characters and depict protagonists who overcome barriers to their incipient romance and also strive to become better, happier people. While The Love of My Afterlife is underpinned by lighthearted moments, it also deals with serious subjects, and this interplay of comedy and philosophy often characterizes the works of Greenwood and her contemporaries. Although the primary focus of such novels remains on the protagonists’ developing romance, topics such as death, trauma, and memory also dominate The Love of My Afterlife. This pattern can also be seen in other comparable romances, such as Ashley Poston’s The Dead Romantics and The Seven Year Slip, Emily Henry’s Beach Read, and Sarah Adler’s Mrs. Nash’s Ashes. 

Just as contemporary romance novels rely on familiar narrative structures, they also feature common tropes and plot devices such as the enemies-to-lovers scenario or the marriage-of-convenience, and they often take place in deliberately quaint settings. The Love of My Afterlife uses many of these conventions, and Delphie and Cooper’s interactions most closely resemble the enemies-to-lovers trope, in which two people with a complicated past together recognize how much their current dynamics are influenced by their earlier false impressions of one another. This trope is intensified by the convention of “fake dating” when Delphi and Cooper’s ruse of pretending to be in a relationship forces them to confront their unaddressed feelings about each other. Similarly, the forced proximity trope—in which the two characters are repeatedly forced into the same settings and situations—creates scenarios that address the unstated feelings that each character has been trying to avoid. However, Greenwood seasons these well-worn plot patterns with a bit of novelty by crafting a paranormal romance that depends upon the terms of Delphie’s afterlife contract with Merritt. 

However, rather than simply adhering to common tropes of the romance genre, Greenwood actively references them in the structure of the novel, creating a playfully metafictional commentary on her own narrative. A prime example of this occurs early in the novel when the narrative reveals that Merritt is fixated on the genre of contemporary romances. This personal interest compels her to allow Delphie to return to Earth and fulfill her romantic ambition to pursue Jonah. Later, however, Delphie realizes that Merritt has been trying to manipulate her interactions with Cooper so that their encounters come to resemble common romance tropes. Only when Delphie recognizes these patterns does she finally understand the broader life lessons that Merritt wants her to learn.