Just how do you define certain genres?

[Swank]

Yes indeed: still trying to wrap my head around how the genre is going to determine how the characters are going to act.
It seems so Upside-down and backwards.
The characters determine how to act in any setting or else they have no agency.
The point of many Sci-Fi what-ifs is--if this happens in some future how do real people react to it(or at least how does my main character react to it). So yes the setting is important but it doesn't mold the characters. Otherwise you really could just keep changing characters drastically and not change the story.

More importantly, the category of characteristics that define one genre might be entirely missing from another. Western is a setting, mystery is a loose plot format, romance is available at the super market, etc. They aren't mutually exclusive at all, so their genre can't dictate any particular category of the way it is written.

 

[The Big Peat]

@The Big Peat What's an UU?

Unseen University - Pratchett's magic school, as referenced in DAgent's first post. Read as any school of wizardry/magic/witchcraft etc.etc.



Re the whole genre can help writers just like a trope...

Well, yes. Of course. Genres are basically collections of tropes. To know a genre is to know a whole slew of the things, all connected and wriggly.

The extent to which they help writers is the same as tropes do. I think most writers are happy for only having a working subconscious knowledge of the blighters. Out of those who like knowing more, I think the majority of that number do so because they like coming in with their dynamite and wrecking balls, and like to know exactly where to hit the walls to make the biggest mess.

The number of authors who like knowing about genre to help them write in that genre are, I think, few. I don't really recommend trying to be one of them unless you're horribly aware you're one of them (I suspect I am). There is a lot of second-guessing in the brain.

Where I think it comes most in useful is in recognising that you've walked into a trap in edits... but that's editor knowledge, not writer knowledge.


Also, per my usual "this stuff is hard enough without trying to load up everything in your head", I think there's enough challenges in writing good prose, finding interesting material, and recognising how to write interesting narratives without getting really stuck on genre, beyond the parts of genre that are baked into interesting narrative. You get enough of the stuff from that, no need to go hard beyond it.

 

[Harpo]

@The Big Peat What's an UU?

It are a acronym from Unseen University, it be.

 

[paranoid marvin]

Genres can be annoying, especially if you are going into a bookshop looking for a particular.

So I'm looking for a 'Fighting Fantasy' book. Is it in the general section? No. Is it in the fantasy section? No. Is it in the young adult section? No. It's in the 'Ages 8-11' section (not sure who chose that one!).

Alice in Wonderland. Is it in the general section? No. Is it in the fantasy section? No. Is it in the young adult section? No. It's in the 'Classics' section.

There are times when I just want an A-Z by author section of all the books please

 

[Swank]

There are times when I just want an A-Z by author section of all the books please

Those must be times when you know the author's name.

 

[sknox]

There should be a way to do a digital search, especially with larger bookstores. Browsing is one strategy, but digital search is a quite different one. Sometimes one is more efficient than another. Card catalogs are a third, but I think those don't have much chance of being implemented in a bookstore!

 

[Swank]

There should be a way to do a digital search, especially with larger bookstores. Browsing is one strategy, but digital search is a quite different one. Sometimes one is more efficient than another. Card catalogs are a third, but I think those don't have much chance of being implemented in a bookstore!

The reason bookstores and libraries are divided by genre is not so you can find a specific book. It is so you can find other similar books.

If you are looking for something specific they have employees and card catalogs.



Sometimes these debates seem to ignore reality.

 

[sknox]

How do I find similar books without first finding or at least knowing the specific book to which I am comparing the others?

Larger bookstores do in fact have digital search capability, but (at least with B&N) access is restricted to the employees. Who themselves use it in response to one of those requests for a specific book.

Libraries are divided by genre largely because of long-standing practice, now codified by the Library of Congress system in the U.S. Other countries have their own, most of which are similarly the product of a long history of usage. Bookstores, otoh, use genres primarily as a way to help them sell more books.

Some library digital catalogs have a feature that lets you browse the shelf--that is, to see what sits to either side of the particular book in the catalog system. Other catalog software does not have this feature (I think there are fewer and fewer of these over the years). The feature I long for is to select a book, then hit that book's bibliography and have a hyperlink if that cited book is also held by the same library. *sigh*

As for reality, folks around here proudly bring their own with them. <grin>
BYOR

 

[Swank]

How do I find similar books without first finding or at least knowing the specific book to which I am comparing the others?

I don't know if you need to. If you believe the book you enjoyed was a mystery, by all means don't go looking in the YA section - even if it is there. Browse mysteries.

 

[DAgent]

Unseen University - Pratchett's magic school, as referenced in DAgent's first post. Read as any school of wizardry/magic/witchcraft etc.etc.



Re the whole genre can help writers just like a trope...

Well, yes. Of course. Genres are basically collections of tropes. To know a genre is to know a whole slew of the things, all connected and wriggly.

The extent to which they help writers is the same as tropes do. I think most writers are happy for only having a working subconscious knowledge of the blighters. Out of those who like knowing more, I think the majority of that number do so because they like coming in with their dynamite and wrecking balls, and like to know exactly where to hit the walls to make the biggest mess.

The number of authors who like knowing about genre to help them write in that genre are, I think, few. I don't really recommend trying to be one of them unless you're horribly aware you're one of them (I suspect I am). There is a lot of second-guessing in the brain.

Where I think it comes most in useful is in recognising that you've walked into a trap in edits... but that's editor knowledge, not writer knowledge.


Also, per my usual "this stuff is hard enough without trying to load up everything in your head", I think there's enough challenges in writing good prose, finding interesting material, and recognising how to write interesting narratives without getting really stuck on genre, beyond the parts of genre that are baked into interesting narrative. You get enough of the stuff from that, no need to go hard beyond it.

One thing that I have found to be rather constantly bewildering is people demanding certain tropes, beats and so on are not used, either they are are sick of them being used, have some moral objection to them being used.

How a trope or beat is used doesn't seem to matter, no matter how original it's application might be, the simple fact that it's been used at all seems to be all the criteria needed to denounce a work as being bad, or immoral, or cliché or any other term that might be used derogatively.

God knows how someone wanting to write a story examining a theme like sexism would be able to get it accepted as not being an inherently sexiest work.

 

[DAgent]

How do I find similar books without first finding or at least knowing the specific book to which I am comparing the others?

Larger bookstores do in fact have digital search capability, but (at least with B&N) access is restricted to the employees. Who themselves use it in response to one of those requests for a specific book.

Libraries are divided by genre largely because of long-standing practice, now codified by the Library of Congress system in the U.S. Other countries have their own, most of which are similarly the product of a long history of usage. Bookstores, otoh, use genres primarily as a way to help them sell more books.

Some library digital catalogs have a feature that lets you browse the shelf--that is, to see what sits to either side of the particular book in the catalog system. Other catalog software does not have this feature (I think there are fewer and fewer of these over the years). The feature I long for is to select a book, then hit that book's bibliography and have a hyperlink if that cited book is also held by the same library. *sigh*

As for reality, folks around here proudly bring their own with them. <grin>
BYOR

Pretty much every UK library I've been to has kept all fiction in alphabetically order only, not genre. However they also tend to keep children's books in their own section, but some of the choices there can be a bit bewildering.

I've seen Discworld novels in the kids section, and not just the Tiffany Aching novels, which were specifically aimed at kids.

 

[Swank]

One thing that I have found to be rather constantly bewildering is people demanding certain tropes, beats and so on are not used, either they are are sick of them being used, have some moral objection to them being used.

How a trope or beat is used doesn't seem to matter, no matter how original it's application might be, the simple fact that it's been used at all seems to be all the criteria needed to denounce a work as being bad, or immoral, or cliché or any other term that might be used derogatively.

God knows how someone wanting to write a story examining a theme like sexism would be able to get it accepted as not being an inherently sexiest work.

Assuming they read the story, perhaps the use of said trope was obnoxious enough to make them mention it?

 

[paranoid marvin]

Pretty much every UK library I've been to has kept all fiction in alphabetically order only, not genre. However they also tend to keep children's books in their own section, but some of the choices there can be a bit bewildering.

I've seen Discworld novels in the kids section, and not just the Tiffany Aching novels, which were specifically aimed at kids.

Yes, reference books are grouped by the subject, but fiction by the author. Who determines what goes into which section of adult/children's sections though do seem a bit random.

It's the same with retail stores as well though. In HMV they have a section for war & westerns, for tv, for superheroes, for horror, and separate sections for certain brands of publishers (such as 'Arrow'). Trying to find a movie without first finding a shop assistant, can sometimes only be done by searching through all of the different sections. Actually, maybe that's why they do it.

I don't mind in a bookstore if they want to have lots of random sections (whoever can determine what goes in an '8-11' year old section anyway?) just so long as they have all of the books also included in an A-Z of authors section; I'm assuming that they do have more than 1 of each book.

 

[sknox]

In larger U.S. libraries, SF/F gets its own section, as does YA or Juvenile. But the LC system pretty much throws all literature into one bucket. So did Dewey.

From the Dept of Idle Curiosity: what catalog system is used in the UK? Can anyone speak to systems in other countries? I imagine they would use their own, but ... you know, idle curiosity.

 

[DAgent]

In larger U.S. libraries, SF/F gets its own section, as does YA or Juvenile. But the LC system pretty much throws all literature into one bucket. So did Dewey.

From the Dept of Idle Curiosity: what catalog system is used in the UK? Can anyone speak to systems in other countries? I imagine they would use their own, but ... you know, idle curiosity.

As far as I can tell, for fiction in the UK it's just the good old fashioned A-Z method, but for non fiction we use Dewey. Which after doing a quick google, apparently does include ref numbers of fiction too, which I did not know.

 

[sknox]

I wondered if Dewey persisted elsewhere. WRT literature, I don't know of any system that tries to catalog by another other than author. A really big library must have an entire room just for Anonymous. <g>

 

[psikeyhackr]

SDS - Speculative Fiction

 

[BAYLOR]

Vathek by William Beckford written 1786 is classified as gothic horror. It's dark no question, and its got horror a plenty . But given its phantasmagorical setting of unnamed kingdom in an unknown land with the idea of that are demoms who want to purchase the soul of the main protagonist Vathek for the knowledge and treasure of the Pre Adamite Sultan's who ruled the Earth before man, this one clearly belongs in the genre of Fantasy or more specifically Dark Fantasy .

 

[tinkerdan]

re @psikeyhackr
I like that Standfast goes way back to find an 1889 connection.
As to Heinlein--When I looked at his words I had thought he was pushing for it to be the umbrella term over SF and other fiction, which seems to not be in line with what he reads.
Could be I read that wrong--have to check.

 

[psikeyhackr]

re @psikeyhackr
I like that Standfast goes way back to find an 1889 connection.
As to Heinlein--When I looked at his words I had thought he was pushing for it to be the umbrella term over SF and other fiction, which seems to not be in line with what he reads.
Could be I read that wrong--have to check.

Heinlein was saying that some stuff called science fiction would not qualify as speculative fiction. Fantasy was definitely out of his spec-fic box.

Clarke's A Fall of Moondust would qualify but Galactic Odyssey by Keith Laumer would not. GO is an adventure story with FTL and aliens but is just SF tropes explaining nothing about anything or scientific in any way. Just an exciting story. Or at least it was at the age I read it. LOL