# What Is Your...



## Kyle R (May 19, 2012)

...Genre?

Do you write romance? Action? Horror? Crime thrillers? Westerns with elements of Science Fiction? Comedy with a tragic twist?

What is your genre as a writer? (If you wield different styles and genres all the time, then what is the genre of your current work in progress?)


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## Potty (May 19, 2012)

I recently realised I don't have one... but currently I am favoring the humorous scfi.


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## Jon M (May 19, 2012)

Artsy fartsy super boring liturdrary fiction.


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## Potty (May 19, 2012)

Jon M said:


> Artsy fartsy super boring liturdrary fiction.



Was that a dig? I sense a little testosterone!

*Love and hugs and sunshine dust*


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## Jon M (May 19, 2012)

Potty said:


> Was that a dig? I sense a little testosterone!
> 
> *Love and hugs and sunshine dust*


Nah. I've kind of been saying that about my work for a while.


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## Tiamat (May 19, 2012)

Fantasy, chick lit, parody, and sometimes even a little literary fiction.


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## Fallow (May 19, 2012)

Still can't decide between sci-fi and dark fantasy.  I go back and forth between things all the time. . .


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## Cefor (May 19, 2012)

Fantasy, Science Fiction or... moody vignettes? The vignettes/short stories could be described as literary, in some ways, but they also fall into the Speculative Fiction genre; which as we all know is what Fantasy and Science Fiction can be grouped under.

Speculative Fiction all the way, woo!

If I ever turn into an author like Ian McEwan, someone needs to slap me with a branch, cut using a herring, and say "Ni!" at me, until I beg for mercy and I write something more fun.


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## squidtender (May 20, 2012)

Horror. I figure if I have to have nightmares every night, with images of Hell and the end of the world, then I might as well write it down and scare the s**t out of everyone else. Seems to be working so far. . .


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## Robdemanc (May 20, 2012)

I write sci fi fantasy but try to make them as near to reality as I can


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## Sam (May 20, 2012)

Military thriller.


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## Jeko (May 20, 2012)

Surreal fantasy with hints of darkness and blue chocolate.


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## Olly Buckle (May 20, 2012)

I have always had what is known as a butterfly mind, writing is the constant, everything else varies it seems.


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## sunaynaprasad (May 20, 2012)

I write children's magic realism or literary.


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## Grape Juice Vampire (May 20, 2012)

Science fiction and dark/high fantasy. My current work is the latter, and the grittiest thing i've ever written.


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## Vertigo (May 20, 2012)

My thing is spec fic (can't really write traditional SF or high fantasy, so I end up on low fantasy or generic speculative--frequently post-apocalyptic), usually with some odd literary touches and plenty of sarcasm. Neal Stephenson is without a doubt my idol, so far as writers go.


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## dreamer444 (May 20, 2012)

Paranormal mystery mostly but I also have a fantasy, sci-fi, children's fantasy, and a couple romances started.  I like to have a variety so if I get stuck on one I can switch to something else.


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## CFFTB (May 20, 2012)

Non-fiction. If I can get out of the expository journalist news article rut.


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## Gonzalothethird (May 21, 2012)

I started out in Fantasy until I developed a writing style where then I dabbled in every genre to find my preference. Turns out its Crime Thillers. So for the last four years I dedicated my writing to solely Crime Thrillers. Recently I've been working on contemporary fantasy work to get my mind active again while my MS is getting the editing treatment. I'm also going to polish up old Horror short stories I wrote yeeeeeeeeears ago; get them caught up to the times.


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## Terry D (May 21, 2012)

My first novel was horror.  All of my short fiction has been horror.  My current work-in-progress is a crime thriller.


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## Gamer_2k4 (May 21, 2012)

I call my current work science fiction because it has technological elements that don't exist in the present day, but it's certainly not Star Wars or something like that.  The story is driven by war and death and loss, and the characters form the core of the story more than any plot would.


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## TheBelindaAngel (May 21, 2012)

I write whatever flows into my brain, with a dark little twist.


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## Olly Buckle (May 21, 2012)

One wonders what causes things to flow into the brain with a dark little twist, and what that's like. Then wonders again if perhaps he meant "... brain, and add a dark little twist."


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## TheBelindaAngel (May 21, 2012)

She meant 'with' - as in a cocktail.


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## Olly Buckle (May 21, 2012)

I do beg your pardon mam, but you do see what I mean about the way it is phrased associating the flowing and the dark twist?


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## Notquitexena (May 21, 2012)

Right now I am writing realistic fantasy - in other words, I try to create a fantasy world where the fantasy parts have enough basis in the natural world that you could imagine an alternate universe where that was reality.


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## TheBelindaAngel (May 22, 2012)

Olly Buckle said:


> I do beg your pardon mam, but you do see what I mean about the way it is phrased associating the flowing and the dark twist?



Fair point Olly, can you see I am new to humbly receiving criticism?  *blush*


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## Neath Lankly (May 22, 2012)

I'm currently writing science fiction/ mystery. I'm 35,000 words in now (first draft) and i'm quite worried about my characters separating down different paths, One path is mystery, another path is science fiction, both paths are intricately entwined. I don't know- am I the only one who worries about how I should categorize my novel. Is it just me, or does anyone else feel like there is a pressure on writers to categorize their novels?

I seen a post the other day about how someone was angry how their science fiction book was classed as fantasy by a publisher. I don't know, personally I don't think i would be insulted. To me its not what I should write to stay within a genre- it's what I have to write.


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## patskywriter (May 22, 2012)

nonfiction: journalism / community news and information
nonfiction: instructive / how-to


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## Cefor (May 22, 2012)

Neath Lankly said:


> I'm currently writing science fiction/ mystery. I'm 35,000 words in now (first draft) and i'm quite worried about my characters separating down different paths, One path is mystery, another path is science fiction, both paths are intricately entwined. I don't know- am I the only one who worries about how I should categorize my novel. Is it just me, or does anyone else feel like there is a pressure on writers to categorize their novels?
> 
> I seen a post the other day about how someone was angry how their science fiction book was classed as fantasy by a publisher. I don't know, personally I don't think i would be insulted. To me its not what I should write to stay within a genre- it's what I have to write.



Mate, authors are categorised differently to how they imagine themselves all of the time. If I were you, I wouldn't worry about it one jot. Make a big deal over it and you look a bit foolish. Each reader will classify the novel in relation to other things they have read, no matter what they tell you.

Write what you want to write, and let the marketing boys decide where to stick your novel 

Good luck!


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## Gamer_2k4 (May 22, 2012)

Neath Lankly said:


> I don't know- am I the only one who worries about how I should categorize my novel.



I couldn't care less about the actual categorization of my book.  Heck, if a publisher wants to call my sci-fi story a "historical romance" to sell more copies, who am I to say no? It doesn't happen in the past and it's not a romance, but I'm not going to refuse more Benjamins.


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## philistine (May 22, 2012)

General fiction, really. I don't know how else to describe it. 

Though the novel I am currently working on could be classed as several things.


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## Terry D (May 22, 2012)

philistine said:


> General fiction, really.



I love military stories! :ChainGunSmiley:


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## squidtender (May 22, 2012)

Terry D said:


> I love military stories! :ChainGunSmiley:



Readlly TD? REALLY? On a Tuesday?ukel:
Keep all your lame jokes for the weekend! LOL


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## philistine (May 22, 2012)

Terry D said:


> I love military stories! :ChainGunSmiley:



Watch it sonny; this belt doesn't just hold my pants up. :abnormal:


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## dale (May 22, 2012)

dark fiction, that for some reason always has a twisted sense of religion infused subtlety within it.


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## starseed (May 23, 2012)

My first novel is a coming of age/romance. 

My new project is a zombie/alien apocalypse (likely to be a series) that falls somewhere between horror, sci-fi and drama, depending on what point in the story you're at. 

I'm all over the place with what I want to write.


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## Axamander (May 28, 2012)

Fantasy, science-fiction, post-apocalyptic fiction, historical fiction, any combination of the above.  I've often considered writing a book chronicling the advance of the European diseases that wiped out the Native Americans in North America, because it's the nearest thing to an apocalyptic plague that has really happened.


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## PaulMcElligott (May 30, 2012)

near-future, high-tech, with a political edge.


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## pauldennis133 (May 30, 2012)

Ultimately I hope to do a combination of Sci-fi/Fantasy and Thriller. My last two short stories were thriller pieces and the next novel/novella I'm planning now is a more sci-fi piece.


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## JosephB (May 30, 2012)

It's literary fiction, I guess. It's about a guy who's wife dies and he goes to where she grew up -- a small town in south Georgia, to learn about her somewhat mysterious past. He ends up staying -- and he encounters all kinds of eccentric characters, including his wife's recluse/folk artist sister who bases her work on religious visions. They fall in love and all kinds of sh*t happens, especially when he finds out why his wife kept her past under wraps. I think it veers a little toward chick-lit -- if anything -- maybe.


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## Lawrence (May 30, 2012)

I enjoy fantasy, high or low. Incorporation of some lessons and morals also makes me like it more. Stories that completely avoid meaningful ones seem empty to me for some reason. I really fell as if writing should be used for more than *just* entertainment.


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## Sunny (Jun 2, 2012)

Everything I write, or _mostly_ everything I write has romance all over it. I can't help it. It's how I am, so it's hard to get away from it. I've tried to write some darker stories, and even those end up having some level of love or at least lost love thrown into the mix somehow. When I try to get away from it, just to try something new, it'll start on that path to mushy-gushy on it's own anyway. I just have to except it I think; I'm a romance writer.


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## Mr mitchell (Jun 3, 2012)

I write Crime and thrillers, the reason for that is the fact is, I seemed to read and want to allow my readers to be tense at the end. I like to surprise my readers on occasions.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 3, 2012)

Who the heck finds time to write?


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## Bloggsworth (Jun 3, 2012)

Mostly unmitigated twaddle...


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## Gerry_VDS (Jun 3, 2012)

I write for alot of generas, but right now? Military first person thriller!


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## SeverinR (Jun 12, 2012)

Jon M said:


> Artsy fartsy super boring liturdrary fiction.


Wow, really makes me want to read that.    

I prefer Fantasy, I have written paranormal/supernatural.


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## Altan (Jun 14, 2012)

Techno-thrillers. With political intrigue and warfare playing major roles.


Although the first fiction I wrote of any substance (obviously its unfinished) could be classified as Action/Adventure/Fantasy and Gothic/Psychological Horror.
It may seem kind of strange, but I'm seriously considering giving those two projects a second try.


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## El Chacal (Jun 17, 2012)

Anything with explicit language and nudity.

And explosions.


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## Hela Depths (Jun 21, 2012)

Mostly fantasy. Almost any kind of fantasy, but I have discovered recently that I just _love _writing dark fantasy, some psychological-gore-magical thing!
Romance is always there in my stories. And, of course, death and sorrow too, because I'm mean.


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## Eluixa (Jun 22, 2012)

Essentially, love stories. Fantasy but more or less similar to our world some five hundred years ago or so. Shorter stories are fiction, our world so far.


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## Oasis Writer (Jun 23, 2012)

I've written epic fantasy and sword and sorcery for the majority of my writing career. I've done journalism and I write a lot of poetry that ranges from genre to genre and style to style, but when it comes to novel writing, fantasy has always been my genre. I think I'll end up trying science fiction or crime thriller someday, but not yet.


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## PassTheDrinks (Jun 23, 2012)

I usually tend to write Psychological Fiction. Most of my main characters seem to always have something psychologically wrong with them. Either that or I like to write Crime Fiction where my main characters commit a crime and the story progresses around how they deal with it.


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## hyphenman (Jun 24, 2012)

I've gone through at least three pages of responses, and I've only seen one other listing, buried in a laundry list of other genres, that matches my genre. I have to say first that I don't even know what some of these genres are, or, and no criticism intended, whether they qualify as genres.

Old fuddy-duddy that I am, I suspect that many of the writers of sci-fi with a twist or a dark side and fantasy and horror are in their teens to early 20s. Just a wild and somewhat baseless assumption.

My chosen genre is kind of funny, since I'm identifying myself as an old codger. It's history, or more precisely, historical adventure. I latched onto it quite inadvertently. I had always planned to do a biography or, if I couldn't collect enough information for that, an article for a popular history magazine. When the historical record was too spotty to support even the latter, that's when I turned to fiction. It was the best decision of my life.

My unsolicited advice for anyone engaged in writing a novel or contemplating it is that the genre doesn't matter, except of course when it's finished and you have to type in a one- or two-word description in the upper right corner. What matters most is the fire inside you. I call it passion. If you don't have it or know whether you have it, I'd say you're in trouble. That's because passion can not only breathe life into your words, it can sustain you for the bumpy, arduous journey ahead.


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## HooktonFonnix (Jun 24, 2012)

SF/Action/Adventure for my current WIP. I didn't choose it, it's just what comes out.


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