READ THIS FIRST and identify your genre here.

Yes, sometimes picking from a list is tough.

You may have elements from one or more of the genres that we list here (which is certainly not comprehensive, just representative of the most popular ones amongst participants). Or you may be breaking all the rules for every existing novel ever written!

So go ahead, give us a description and we'll try to help you find the right lounge and name for it. Or maybe we'll put our heads together to come up with a new one!

The rest of this forum is a fun place for folks who don't have a lounge of their own to gather. If you're creating a new thread for like-minded genre writers to gather, please give your thread an ID for folks to spot quickly:

[Realistic Fiction]
[Espionage]
[Free Verse Poetry Mixed with Futuristic Fantasy]

We've also have a forum for all you folks not writing fiction this year called NaNo Rebels.

If you're writing fanfiction, you can either use the general fanfic thread, or you can go over to the Fans and Critics forum to look for a thread specific to your fandom.

Special Notice We now have the ability for you to SET YOUR OWN GENRE! Just go to edit novel info, select "Other", and enter the genre you'd like to display!

Yes - what Dragonchilde said!

Hi, I'm Connie and I'm a new moderator on this forum. I like to write mainstream fiction, leaning towards mystery with a bit of romance thrown in. I am unpublished, as being published requires one to actually have something COMPLETED, but I am enjoying the process of learning and growing as a writer. I figure by the time I learn what I need to know, I'll have retired from the State and be able to write full time.

I don't know a lot about other genres but I am looking forward to seeing all ones that come hang out here.

I am looking forward to getting to know everyone.

So.... I picked YA by default, since it's pretty broad, but thinking on it, my story is a little controversial for YA. Maybe someone could shed a light?

Synopsis:

Jared and Rose Verona often find themselves needing to tell people that they're just normal siblings who happened to be born on the same day. They don't have any special "twin" psychic link. They don't have their own language. Neither one is the "good" twin or the "evil" twin. And they most certainly aren't reincarnations of past lovers!

And yet, a mutual friend seems obsessed with a Japanese myth which implies the later; That if two lovers kill themsleves together, they'll be reincarnated as twins. "Maybe you're the reincarnations of Romeo and Juliette!" she likes to joke to them.

It's all harmelss teasing, until Jared starts to second guess himself. What if the legend is true? His worries eventually alienate him from Rose, and the two loose track of what it means to be a family.

What about Steampunk? Set in the early 1900's? Is it considered "Other genre" or "Historical Fiction?"

This is my first time to participate in Nanowrimo, by the way.

Woops, just found a thread for Steampunk in the Fantasy lounge. I guess that would be my place, then.

Okay, I don't have a very clear idea of what I'm going to write, but I think it's likely to turn out as a fiction memoir very, very loosly based on my life, with elements of horror and fantasy... I think...
Where would that fit best, as in genre?

Thanks!

vampires? where do we fit those in? I'm nut sure if my vampires are really fantasy or paranormal, but I can't really go to YA since the characters are in their mid-20s.... help?

Oh god, the hardest question I've had to answer for this novel. Basically, if you wrap every genre up into a katamari, roll it around for a while in a library and toss in a little techo-babble.

Congratulations! You have my genre!

My genre is currently listed as "adventure/drama/humor/fanfic," as if I am somehow expected to ram a perfectly good adventure yarn into a steaming pot of story already containing a full-fledged drama and a readable comedy. In actuality, apart from being fanfic, it is none of the above.

For the most part, it's a magical girl anime pastiche, with elements of both deconstruction and reconstruction, musings on the nature of fanfiction and being a fan, sociopathic heroines, blood 'n' guts galore, and a tone that careens wildly from cheerful (if gory) slapstick to roiling cauldrons of blackest angst. However, that sounds sniffily pretentious--not to mention that it's too long to put in a summary--so I may just call it a "magical girl warrior" story (despite that being mostly unknown as a literary genre--anime, sure, but not in books and not in the West). Hopefully that gets the idea across.

Ack, I just realized that I forgot to include the question and the edit function isn't up yet.

Given that I have antiheroes, some urban fantasy elements (black magic and demons), comedy ranging from light slapstick to the deadest of dead baby jokes, a universe-devouring abomination as my main villain, a hopeful ending, a number of action scenes, a Quest for the Pretentiously-Named Plot Artifact (tm), and deconstructive elements, does anyone see a more specific/more familiar genre name than "magical girl"? I've been toying with "dark action comedy," but I'm not sure how user-friendly that is as a descriptor.

I've been having a hard time figuring out what genre to put my novel in. Someone told me she thought it was Sci-Fi, but I don't think so.

Chocolate is illegal. The story is about a woman's life while she comes to terms with her addiction. It's not set in the past or future, it's on earth, and there's nothing different about chocolate than it exists in real life. She gets married, gets divorced, loses her job, sleeps around, falls in love, and gets arrested, but nothing supernatural happens. It's not meant to be humorous. It's just a hypothetical story of, "What If?"

I don't think it's even fantasy. Modern Fiction?

"Chocolate is illegal. The story is about a woman's life while she comes to terms with her addiction. It's not set in the past or future, it's on earth, and there's nothing different about chocolate than it exists in real life. She gets married, gets divorced, loses her job, sleeps around, falls in love, and gets arrested, but nothing supernatural happens. It's not meant to be humorous. It's just a hypothetical story of, "What If?"

Nope - this is definitley a horror story. :) Interesting premise.

A college student was raised by his grandmother, who is a voodoo mambo (priestess). She keeps it quiet, because she's pretty sure her neighbors would lynch her if they found out, but she raised her grandson to always keep an altar, give thanks to the spirits, etc. Because of this, when the student's appendix bursts on the holy day of his family's guardian, said guardian intercedes to try and save him. Voodoo-related adventure ensues.

Would this be fantasy, supernatural, adventure, or horror?

The story takes place in a "parallel" earth, Where a single race waged war against all others, even the animals. Completely eradicating all non-Aura species. (the race are called Auras) They were slaves who stumbled over the six guardian spirits, beings tied to the planet who were vowed to protect it. They chose to help the Auras not realizing that their hatred was so intense, the auras tricked them and used their powers against each other binding the guardians to their will.

They used the captured technology from the other races, specifically the Lorics, robotic sentries used by the more advanced races to fight their wars. After the genocidal wars (dubbed the cleansing) the Auras retreated into spectacular domed cities some as large as entire u.s. states. Each city governs itself reporting to the capital. After retreating to the domes, the Auras realized that they overlooked a genetic mutation in the own biology. The mutation varies from person to person, some appearing at birth, others during puberty.

These mutations (referred to as mutates) are immediately "cleansed".

The government is strongly class based, nobility and titles are more important than hard work. Everything you have is based around your title. Titles are earned by amassing wealth, or by proving your magical worth. The world is very strongly influced by its magic, sometimes to the point that technology and magic are indistinguishable. The machines are run by magic, and everything is run by the machines

The story itself revolves around the son of a minor noble, Micheal Kelpher, who is found out as a mutate. It follows the first six months of his attempts to hide and find a place in a world, mostly scrounging around in sewers and hunting for any other mutates in the substrate of the city. He finds companions, a handful of rebellions and a few shambling cities constantly on the move trying to escape death. Focused on his interaction and thoughts rather than action, though there is enough to satisfy, but there is no real quest or goal he sets himself on.

I'm pretty sure it's Sci-Fi but i want to get some opinions. Actually I'm 99% sure its Sci-Fi, however a friend said it was fantasy so I'm covering my bases.

iamwill - Steampunk can fall under a number of broad genres. Fantasy is only one of them -- and only appropriate if your particular steampunk world has fantasy elements like magic, elves, whatever. Science fiction is the typical heading if it doesn't. Or you can just call it "steampunk" and call it good. ;)

alastor993 - It doesn't matter if it's loosely based on your life, if it has elements of fantasy and horror, it's not going to be mainstream or just a "memoir". ;) It'll be whichever of those is more appropriate. (Fantasy can be scary, and horror can have fantastic things, so it depends on whether the primary point of it is to be scary/creepy or not.)

Kia_Zi_Shiru - Vampires can fall under either fantasy or horror/supernatural, depending. And I'm not entirely certain myself what that might depend on. I'd personally call it "horror" if your vampires are intended to be scary. But I've yet to figure out what the difference actually is between "urban fantasy" and "supernatural" -- a lot of the stuff that gets labeled "supernatural", I would have called "urban fantasy", and a lot of the stuff that gets labeled "magical realism", I'd have called "supernatural"... I'm so confused. You're not the only one, hehe.

Gryphonsflight - You said nothing about what your story is actually about, though. :P So I'm just going to blindly slap "science fantasy" in your general direction. :)

Tom M. Surname - I'd consider the "magical girl" genre to fall under urban fantasy, myself.

MzHartz - Yes, that's science fiction, or more broadly, speculative fiction. Scifi doesn't need to be about the future, or aliens, or spaceships, or what-have-you. Often the main point of scifi is to ask "what if?" You're creating an alternate world that's just a little different from our own in order to explore social/cultural issues, of sorts. You can call it "speculative fiction" if you like, if you really feel that uncomfortable putting it as scifi. ;)

When I Met Her - I'd call that "urban fantasy". But see my comments to Kia_Zi_Shiru about "urban fantasy" versus "supernatural".

I have no idea what genre my story fits into. I have already attempted to go and find but it just ends up with me more confused. I am thinking somewhere along the lines of science fantasy but would like some help.
Here is my synopsis.
Jamie an unlucky new recruit, who only wants to study history, gets his paperwork mixed up and ends up in a special unit where he finds a world beyond his own. His new teammates include a superstitious ghost who used to be a goddess, an android plagued by philosophic questions, a possessed person with a thing for catch phrases of doom (and narm) and a kid mechanic who also happens to be the traveling shovel of death.
So, while he works to straighten out his paper work, and after growing to like his new place in life remix it up, he has to do his new job. From the time he signs the nondisclosure agreement Jamie’s life is in the hands of an author determined to write 50k in a month and the random button on TV tropes.
If you have any questions please ask them.
This is on Earth.

I think mine falls somewhere between literary fiction, mainstream fiction, and thriller.

It's the story of two young men, Isaak and William, who meet as college roommates and eventually develop a very close (and eventually physical) relationship. William considers it just a fling, but Isaak is in love. Each assumes that the other is on the same page. Things get complicated, however, when William meets a young woman named Rose over the summer and decides to pursue a relationship with her. Isaak does not take this well, and begins plotting revenge. His methods are quite unorthodox, and in the end, ill fated. His plan goes awry, resulting in lives both lost and ruined.

It's very much a character-driven story and psychology plays a big role.

Hi there!

The novel I'm writing is a crossover of so many genres that I have absolutely no idea how to classify it coherently. I don't want to delve into the plot in too much detail because I don't have the thing worked out to my complete satisfaction as of yet, but it centres around a young woman in her early twenties who, prior to the beginning of the story, came to possess super powers through, doesn't want or enjoy them but feels obligated to use them, which leads her into a life as a masked vigilante that she despises (it all sounds very tired and clichéd, I know, but I considering the plot I have worked out I think I've created a story that differs from the norm as far as superhero stories are concerned, so I'm really excited to write it). She is not the only superhero in the novel but she is the only one who masks her identity, and aside from this there is also a VERY prevalent love story and some extremely dark and disturbed elements. It's kind of a hodgepodge of action, adventure, sci fi and romance, and even a little bit chick lit, so I have absolutely no idea how I specify a single genre and help would be greatly appreciated!

whimsicaldreamer - Certainly sounds like science fantasy to me. And possibly comedy/parody as well.

korikatamarisan - I think "character driven" vs. "plot driven" is a poor method of trying to determine genre. It doesn't really sound like literary fiction to me. Lit fic tends toward being "deep and meaningful", I think.

juicycapoochie - Less of a hodgepodge than you might think. We can, for instance, throw out all plot-based genres right here -- they're not applicable with setting-based genres, which supercede them. :) The minute you start including non-real elements, you're immediately in some variety of speculative fiction -- scifi, fantasy, and/or horror.

I'm not sure where to classify my project. Here's the summary:

Quote:Highly individualistic Jefferson Adams receives yet another diary for his fourteenth birthday. Politically astute, he begins keeping a meticulous record (in haiku, just to be odd) of the world around him, both his local community of Arlington and the greater United States. He avidly follows the events of the 2000 Presidential Election and believes, when Bush finally emerges victorious, that he has just witnessed the most monumental event of his life.
He is wrong.
Mere days into his sophomore year of high school, Jefferson's world is shaken, literally and figuratively, when he is forced to evacuate his school because a plane has crashed into the nearby Pentagon. Frightened and confused, suddenly plunged into a new world, Jefferson must struggle to re-establish himself in a world stood on its head, growing up too quickly and trying to maintain his identity.

I kind of tried to shoehorn it into Historical Fiction, but I don't think it really fits there. I could call it political fiction, but I honestly don't know. Help? Maybe? Please?