What is genre, anyway?
August 23, 2007
I’m gearing up for National Novel Writing Month again this year. In the process I’m looking through some of my novel-writing books, trying to pull the practical clues out. (That means I’m ignoring Natalie Goldberg.)
One piece of advice I find repeated several places is that new writers should avoid mixing genres. There are two reasons for this: first, people tend to buy books of a certain genre because they want the kind of story that genre offers. I can sympathize…
I: And what is this one: Spring Surprise?
H: Ah, that’s one of our specialties. Covered in dark, velvety chocolate, when you pop it into your mouth, stainless steel bolts spring out and plunge straight through both cheeks.
I: Where’s the pleasure in THAT? If people pop a nice little chockie into their mouth, they don’t expect to get their cheeks pierced! [ source ]
The other argument is that if publishers can’t figure out where in the bookstore your novel goes, they can’t market it. And if they can’t market it, they can’t sell it — so they won’t buy it.
Literary whinges about lazy readers and commercial publishers aside, that makes a lot of sense to me. A romance novel might have a little bit of mystery in it, but it is still primarily a romance — and if you let the mystery drive the plot, you’ll lose the genre readers. Most of the genres describe plot anyway: horror, romance, political thriller.
The standouts appear to be science fiction and fantasy. Are the elements of these genres primarily plot elements? Or are they setting elements?
After some reflection it seems to me that science fiction and fantasy — like humor — are often blended with some other genre of fiction. Richard K. Morgan’s Thirteen, for example, is political thriller in a sci-fi landscape.
What does pure fantasy look like? Pure sci-fi? In a culture where the concepts are so deeply ingrained already, are the pure forms of these genres even relevant? Or are they now just a setting decision, like one might set a story in France?
Posted in Art and Writing
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August 23rd, 2007 at 2:38 pm
Genre is a bookselling consideration. It’s very useful for organizing books on shelves, or in catalogs, and in targeting specific readers. It would be wrong to think it’s unimportant or irrelevant when trying to market a book, but when writing one, I think it should enter into the equation as little as possible.
When I walk into a bookstore, I do want there to be divisions — a science fiction section, for instance, a philosophy section, a romantic-manga-antebellum-vampire-comedy-in-illustrated-sestina-format-for-kids section, whatever — because it makes shopping and finding what I’d like to read easier. But when I find those books, I want them to be good stories, first and foremost. And I think that any writing done with marketing as its first consideration is doomed to produce some pretty lousy (which is not to say unmarketable) results.
August 23rd, 2007 at 2:41 pm
By the way, best of luck with NaNoWriMo. A couple of people have suggested I try the 3-Day Novel Writing Contest this year, but I don’t know if I’m quite that insane.
August 24th, 2007 at 8:30 am
I don’t know; general market considerations are probably just fine when writing, and some truly awful stuff seems to sell very, very well. Look at Brian Lumley’s novels, for example, or Mercedes Lackey. Or Robert Jordan. Market considerations are audience considerations, and if you’re writing to an audience that’s something to keep in mind.
I’m not saying you should write children’s books because those are hot right now, or lay off the epic fantasy because it doesn’t sell. I am saying that it’s appropriate, when writing a romance novel, to try and understand what about romance novels makes them romance novels and be sure you hit those marks.
August 24th, 2007 at 7:39 pm
I am with you on the market being the audience, and if you aren’t writing for the reader you are probably in someplace covered with ivy and incoherence for its own sake — difficult, obscure, self-centered literary is the genre with the most dust.
In general I think of the larger divisions of fiction as mainstream, historical, and sci-fi/fantasy. Mainstream is set in the present world but may have elements of fantasy and is certainly tied to history, but the main characters are contemporary people with the writer. Historicals have main characters whose lives begin and end in a definable earlier time, and the stories are researched to that time. Sci-fi/fantasy are in future or other worlds that are imagined, although they may also be very researched and based on extrapolations from religious and cultural traditions that are historical.
Within these three divisions, genres like horror, romance, mystery, etc., apply. The reader generally looks for a good story in a world they can understand with characters whose problems, actions, and consequences are understandable. Another important take-away that the reader is looking for is something memorable — a character, an understanding of events, or a perspective — that expands their own world.
If you have your reader firmly in mind just as you have the character and the situation, you can find a way to unfold your story. Speaking, of course from pure hypothesis…