Fantasy - sub genres

[psychotick]

Hi,

Just a quick aside since it was asked, it's science fiction when you move away from 'magic' and into seemingly scientific explanations for how things work. Don't get me wrong, you can still have magic of a sort. You just have to explain it within some sort of scientific paradigm. Psychokinesis, psionics, telepathy, mutancy, mind melds etc.

Cheers, Greg.

[AMB]

Originally Posted by TheTomG

Why don't we INVENT some new ones too while we're here? That would be fun!

Subliminal Fantasy. Doesn't have any elements of what you might think of as fantasy, but you come away from it with the definite feeling that what you read was indeed a fantasy novel.

[AnyaKimlin]

Originally Posted by psychotick

Hi,

Just a quick aside since it was asked, it's science fiction when you move away from 'magic' and into seemingly scientific explanations for how things work. Don't get me wrong, you can still have magic of a sort. You just have to explain it within some sort of scientific paradigm. Psychokinesis, psionics, telepathy, mutancy, mind melds etc.

Cheers, Greg.

Thanks, Greg

[Hex]

re: urban fantasy -- I had a story with a completely rural setting (although there was a school and a bus, and houses) and the people who published it defined it as 'urban' fantasy

[AnyaKimlin]

ahh see I wondered about that. My sort of contemporary fantasy - is urban apart from the first is set in Blackpool but the second in North Scotland (it's about as rural as the UK can get). But maybe it's more paranormal/horror in place, This is interesting lol

[Hex]

My story was set in the north of scotland too. I think they defined it as 'urban' because people had mobile phones etc and there were no vampires. Also, the place itself was a factor in the story -- more than a backdrop, I mean.

Wikipedia says urban fantasy needs to be set in a city, though, so who knows...?

[Abernovo]

There is also something called 'Contemporary Rural Fantasy, for which I found this: http://www.tor.com/blogs/2010/07/dow...l-fantasy#more

Oddly enough, I did try a short story in this sub-genre (unusual enough, as I tend more to science fiction) and got told that there was no market for rural stories. I think I might try again, somewhere else.

As an aside, I do think that genres and their sub-genres are more marketing ploys than anything else, trying to pigeon-hole authors - 'the next Harry Potter' or 'today's Tolkien'.

[AnyaKimlin]

ok let's see Contemporary High-Fantasy and Contemporary Fantasy for the other.

[Phoenixthewriter]

Originally Posted by TheTomG

I get concerned that people fret too much about categories and fitting into them, rather than just writing what they want

I agree. However, perhaps someone is writing what they want, but needs, in the end, to figure out in what category their masterpiece lies.

[TheTomG]

I am not sure they do - why would they need to categorize it? A good blurb will be more important than dropping something into a category, particularly a sub-genre. I don't think categories are particularly useful, other than broad sweeping items such as "SF" or "Fantasy", once we get into micro-categories I don't know if it is worth worrying about even after you've written it.