I apologize to everyone who’s ever bought my book or taken a class with me, but getting hung up on identifying your genre, subgenre and/or category1 is a soul-sucking distraction.
Obviously I’ve contributed to this problem immensely and so have countless agents and editors by telling writers they better understand their genre! (go read every bestseller in your genre!), by asking them to pitch only in specific genres, and by delivering exhortations to find the perfect comps in their genre, etc.
Everything starts and ends with your genre. Right?
Yes, it does matter. For example, I can’t very well report on publishing industry trends without talking about specific genres and categories. Publishers can’t announce new imprints without saying what genres or categories those imprints focus on. And you can’t begin to research comps until you grasp what shelf you’re likely on. Readers may have trouble finding your book if it’s not categorized properly, whether physically in a store or in its metadata.
Nevertheless…
Industry professionals disagree all the time about genres and what constitutes a genre or subgenre or category. Hell, they even use the term “genre” and “category” in ways that aren’t all that consistent with one another2. Genre boundaries are fuzzy. New genres and subgenres emerge over time (hello, romantasy!).
And what do you often hear from agents and editors alike? We want genre-bending stories! We want things that defy categorization! Upend our expectations!
Because that’s what great writers do. They frankly do not give a damn about these labels because they are trying to do great work that transcends labels.
There is an organization called the Book Industry Study Group that is tasked with managing BISAC codes that help the industry categorize books. There is a committee that meets to review and update BISAC codes every year. I would never in my life want to sit on that committee and neither do you. It’s their thankless job to update the 6,000 codes in 54 categories and decide if and when it’s time to add, delete, or revise these categories. (E.g., should a BISAC code exist for women’s fiction? Discussing that with dozens of other publishing professionals sounds like the ninth circle of hell.)
Guess what? Amazon uses their own category system and layers keywords on top of it. Libraries have their own system, too (CIP data). Bookstores, retailers, and anyone who deals with books can ignore what the publisher says and decide what category or shelf best fits a book.
I see writers obsess over categorization before they’ve even written a single word of their book. The problem can be especially bad among memoirists who want to know if their XYZ-type memoir will sell in today’s market. But that label will have little or nothing to do with its appeal. Instead, it’ll depend entirely on whether the story has been in the media, or if the author has a platform, or if the manuscript carries that magical combination of story and voice that makes editors and agents fall over themselves to acquire/represent it.
Sometimes writing coaches, editors, and instructors, in their patient and endless efforts to get writers to actually decide what their book is about—or in an effort to instill discipline and focus—will push those writers to identify their genre and subgenre. They might even offer a list to choose from.
As soon as you do that, one of two things will happen. Writers will ask:
“You didn’t list X. What about X?”
“But what if my work combines two/three/four/more of these?”
If you answer even one of those questions it will sprout 10 more just like it.
What happens next is even more insidious and self-defeating for everyone involved, even though the poor writer thinks otherwise.
“But how does this advice apply to my subgenre!”
“Tell me more about my subsubgenre that no one else writes in!”
“But does this guidance really apply to my subgenre?
“My work is too unique to learn from general advice!”
At this point, if you’re an educator, you are truly sunk and also you kind of dug your own grave. You told writers genres and subgenres mattered and they believed you. They will never stop looking for the rules to follow.
You want someone to provide you with a “master list” of genres, subgenres, or categories.
You look for “official” definitions of every genre or subgenre.
You try to figure out if a particular genre or subgenre is trending or selling well so that you can adjust your pitch according. (Grief memoirs don’t sell? Then this book is definitely not a grief memoir, no siree!)
You blame your lack of success on your genre or genre-related identity.
You look for marketing and promotion strategies that work specifically for your genre because it’s just that special.
Of course I’m aware that some genres or subgenres can be in decline or get ignored or abandoned by the big houses.3 Westerns is a classic example. Or maybe not—there are signs of its return in the neo-Western! Which is exactly my point. You’ll find books all the time that break the rules or are simply categorized or positioned differently so the market sees them as relevant.4
Think back to the first time you were told your sun sign. “You’re a Libra, dear.” Did everything make sense to you at that point when you heard what Libras are like? Or did you think it’s all nonsense?
Either way I’m willing to bet that you more or less went about your life as usual. (Please, astrologists, don’t write me angry emails.) Maybe on occasion you thought, “Ah, that’s my Libra side.” It’s one reference point out of many. But you didn’t start saying, in response to whomever told you that you’re a Libra, TELL ME ALL ABOUT THEM SO I KNOW HOW TO ACT FROM NOW ON.
Don’t let the genre label dictate who you are and what or how you write (or market and promote). Sure, knowing that label helps you understand the market or readership, to know how others might see you and respond to your work, what expectations they might form in advance—or what expectations you want them to form. (I’m a Libra! Don’t force me to make a decision!)
But still, you must proceed as if you retain creative control. Because you do have control, and life has choices for you to make whether you’re a Libra or not, and you’re the one who makes meaning out of it all.
It’s all invented. Books and categories are invented. What you decide to write is invented. And at some point, it will carry a label. When it’s necessary to use the label (because you need a shortcut and a signal for telling people where your work exists on a spectrum, just as we have latitude and longitude to help pinpoint things, but they are not actual lines burned into the Earth’s soil!), then use the label—precisely because it’s useful, especially when it’s time to market and promote. But you don’t seek permission from your label (or from your latitude and longitude on Earth). It’s a tool that serves you but unfortunately writers lacking confidence have a propensity to treat it as a dictator, crystal ball, and rulebook, all in one.
About right now someone is formulating a comment to talk about the industry awful-awfuls, how it’s all money focused and it likes to put people in boxes, and thank you Jane for pointing out these hideous problems in the industry.
This post isn’t about the publishing industry. It’s about the difficulty in helping writers navigate a creative industry. And my attempts to put a structure on it can inevitably cause harm, especially to writers who take it all quite seriously or people who want to do things very correctly and/or those who focus on these tiny predictors5 because the actual writing thing is hard and these obsessions can give you two things at once: (1) avoidance of the work and (2) something or someone else to blame when it all goes wrong. That editor/agent/publisher is biased against my category! The industry is so unfair to my genre of work! Etc.
It might be. But this post is about writers and labels and my struggles with both.
There’s even a problem here, in having to use three terms and not one.
Very generally speaking, category is the biggest, most all-encompassing term. Your category might be fiction, nonfiction, or children’s, for example. Your genre might be fantasy (which could fall under the category of children’s or under the category of fiction). Your subgenre might be epic fantasy, which falls under the genre of fantasy. Typically when I teach writers about pitching, I’m most adamant about knowing your category. You should know if you’re writing fiction or nonfiction. You should know if you’re writing for adults or children. But obviously some categories blur the lines: YA is read by both adult and children. When agents and editors discuss what they’re looking for, they may use the term “category” and “genre” interchangeably.
A good example is historical romance. Harlequin recently announced it would no longer continue publishing its historicals line. Meanwhile, Julia Quinn of Bridgerton fame has raised nearly half a million dollars for a subscription box for historical fiction. There is an audience for everything and the big houses are not the final word on what sells, only what works for them.
When my husband read my post, he pointed out that the genre of “yacht rock” did not exist until the term was coined in 2005 by an online comedy video series. When Donald Fagen of Steely Dan was told recently that his music is “yacht rock,” he responded with an expletive.
I’ve stolen the term tiny predictors from Adam Mastrioanni, who has written an article every writer should read about “debogging” yourself.
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