#AtoZchallenge Genre

Genre is a word used to categorize the style of a piece of writing and often dictates where in a bookstore or library you will find a book.

Knowing your genre is important because certain publishers and/or agents specialise in different genres, and there is no point pitching your historical romance novel to a publisher or agent who specialises in science fiction and fantasy. It’s also important to readers because different genres have different conventions and you don’t want to disappoint or mislead them before they’ve had a chance to become fans.

The best way to become familiar with a genre is to read widely in it. You learn the tropes and style the genre requires, the language used and the expected length. Only by being very familiar with a genre can you expect to be able to break its rules successfully and keep fans reading.

A novel-length piece of fiction is unlikely to be just one genre. A thriller may have romance in it. A sci-fi novel may have elements of action and adventure. This is fine. You just need to identify what the primary genre for your book might be. Anything else that’s in there is fine, as long as you still follow the rules for that genre.

But what about breaking the rules? Yes, it’s possible, but you need to really know the rules before you break them. And it’s never a good idea to break all the conventions of a genre in one book, even if you think you’re on to something completely groundbreaking. Maybe you are, but readers of that genre may not be ready to have all the tropes they expect from a genre to be exploded at once.

For example, I recently started re-working a story I had previously called a historical romance. Having finished re-working it, I realised that while it does hit some romance novel tropes, it actually fulfils more of the genre conventions of a western. But it’s not set in the Wild West, or even in America!

So what I have is an Australian western. I’ve twisted the expectation that a western must be set in one of those lawless western American states, but followed many of the other conventions of the genre. And of course, thrown in a romantic subplot. But the romance is not the primary driver of the novel, so therefore, if I was looking for this particular book in a bookstore, I wouldn’t be heading for the romance section, but for the westerns.

Oh, and one more thing.... Contrary to popular belief, Young Adult is not a genre - it’s a category or age-range. Although confusingly, when using the “where in the library or bookshop would I find it” model, you generally will find all the YA books in one place, regardless of whether they are fantasy, horror, contemporary or romance.

Confusing, isn't it?