WHY KNOWING GENRE IS IMPORTANT Carolyn Haines

WHY KNOWING GENRE IS IMPORTANT Carolyn Haines

When I first started writing, I didn’t have a clue what I was writing—and I didn’t care. I was writing a story that just had to be told. I was a journalist, so I wasn’t well-schooled in point of view, structure, narrative summary versus immediate scene, or any of the writer’s tools that are used to create unforgettable experiences in the pages of a novel.

I wrote without any real thought of being published. I wrote because I loved writing, words, language, and drawing people into my private and very special world. Eighty books later and after working with a lot of the big New York publishing houses, I know differently. A writer really should know his/her genre and should know the elements of story expected in each genre. Not to be a great writer, but to be a published writer.

The human animal loves stories. We learn from them intellectually and emotionally. We “walk in someone else’s shoes” and that experience can teach us compassion and so much more. But humans also enjoy a certain pattern, a way that story unfolds. Doesn’t mean you can’t do it differently, only that when you do it differently, know what you’re doing and make it count.

The 14 years I was director of the fiction writing program at the University of South Alabama, this is one of the basic lessons I taught. Know your genre. So here’s the spiel. Back in the good old days when books weren’t sold in genre sections and bookstores, there were novels and nonfiction. From now on, I’m only talking about fiction. The authors were alphabetized. I would have been near Grisham and King. Now, though, books are slotted into sections like mystery, fantasy, general fiction, etc.

There are four basic elements to a novel: setting, character, plot, and theme. All books have these elements. I have added a fifth element to some novels called style—this is when an author is so powerful, you can read a few lines or paragraphs and recognize the author by the style of the writing. For example James Lee Burke. The man is a master in the use of language. His style is unique. Elmore Leonard, the same. There are many others. Both of these authors write mysteries, basically, but I would classify them as literary writers and put them in “general fiction” category.

A novel is a book that uses the four elements in equal measure. Theme is as important as setting. Character is as vital as plot. It is a balanced telling of the story at hand with all the richness that comes from a balanced novel.

To me (and yes, I made all of this up) genre fiction takes those four elements and warps it slightly. And here the genres come into play. If you pick up a book in the romance section, the element of character and relationship is going to play a big and vital role. In some “romances,” there is little plot development—it is all internal conflict and emotion. Often the theme—and never forget that this is VERY VERY comforting to some readers—is that love prevails. The readers who come to this category want to shut the cover of the book and be in a place where their belief in true love is affirmed. That is a key part of many romances.

In the world of horror, what element would you think is most important? IT can be any of them, but for our purposes, let’s say setting. The haunted house. The cabin isolated in the woods. Being shut off from others is a way to heighten the danger and put the reader in the place where they have no external help. It ups the ante for the creep factor. Of course a creepy character can play as significant a role as setting, just as in mystery there is great debate whether character or plot are most important. I contend that the best mysteries deliver both. So these are not hard and fast category designations but more of a shorthand way to look at your writing and weigh what is most important to you. Where you might fit in.

Fantasy—setting. World building is one of the key elements of good fantasy. Think of Tolkien or Harry Potter. What fabulous worlds they gave us. But both Tolkien and Rowling are masters because the characters, the plots, the settings, and the themes are equally important and well done.

Thrillers—plot, generally. And remember that a thriller must have a ticking clock and very high stakes. This is why, even though editors say they don’t want serial killer books, they often buy them. Because if a person dies in the first pages of a book, then the worst that can happen already has. But if the killer can kill and kill again—he must be stopped at all costs.

Most people read thrillers and mysteries for a sense of justice. In many mysteries, the overall common theme is “justice prevails.” Just as “love prevails” works in romances. But the better written books take those thematic elements and weave them so tightly into the characters and plots that each story becomes a jewel, a masterpiece. I wrote a mystery called FEVER MOON. The broad theme is justice prevails. It’s set in 1944 Louisiana and the protagonist is a wounded veteran who returns to Iberia Parish, Louisiana as the sheriff. The richest man in the parish is murdered and a young woman, Adele, who appears to be in the throes of some supernatural “spell” is accused of the murder. She is found hovering over the eviscerated body. The people in town think she is a loup garou, a werewolf. But the sheriff knows better. He’s seen the worst humans can do to each other in WWII. And he defends her. This is a mystery, but the theme is truly “how our belief systems control us in ways we never think about.” The people believe in the loup garou, and they are willing to kill a young woman they believe is a shapeshifter because they believe she is evil. So while all books have a theme, and some only explore a broad, category theme, others dig deeper. This, too, is part of a writer’s style.

Every genre has a number of sub-genres and it’s handy to know these because these categories are a short cut in selling and marketing your book. Even if you self-publish, you need to know what you’re writing so you can find the audience that wants to read your book.

Books go in trends, just like fashion. Hemlines go up and come down. It was so interesting to me when I was teaching that only two or three of my students wanted to write mysteries. I’d grown up on Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Mysteries were my favorite reading material. But the young folks I was teaching had grown up on Harry Potter and fantasy was the type of story they loved and wanted to write. I did an intensive study of J.K. Rowling’s world of Harry Potter and came away even more impressed than I was before by her keen ability to plot. I do believe that she had the whole series plotted out long before she wrote them. The over-all arc of the series is terrific, and each book advances that. I’d always enjoyed fantasy, but I read a whole lot of it to be as informed as I could about the genre my students wanted to write.

While I was teaching, dystopian fantasy was a big seller. I didn’t enjoy reading this, but I read enough to learn how it was put together and how it worked.

If you approach an agent with your work, your cover letter should contain the type of book and the word count. Something like, “My novel, THE DARKLING, is a 90,000 word gothic thriller that explores the physical manifestation of a desperate need for love.” This gives a look at the type, size, and thematic elements. Gothic says it’s horror, and thriller addresses the pacing of the story and the stakes. This allows the agent (or editor) to go through their mental rolodex to think about a home for this book. Who’s looking for this type of fiction? It also allows them to decide if it’s a book they’d enjoy reading. You don’t want an agent trying to sell something he or she doesn’t love.

Knowing the genre elements can also help a writer stay on track. If you’re writing a thriller, you might not want to slow the pace with a long, lengthy, tender love scene. In a thriller, nothing should interfere with the pace. Just as in a tender romance you don’t want a chain-sawing villain to make an appearance.

Most of us write instinctively, based on our hours and days and years of reading. That’s how I wrote my first books. There was no internet, no on-line articles or classes or really any way for me to connect with other writers. Now writers have the internet, conferences, lectures, and classes on-line. It’s a much different world. And editors and agents expect writers to know the business. Writing a great book isn’t enough any more. I hate saying that, but I believe it to be true.

The more you know about what you’re writing, the cleaner and more focused your writing will be. Your chances of getting an agent or a bigger audience increase with everything you learn. Your ad placement depends on your genre.

I’ve learned that every single profession, no matter how fabulous, has the business side to it. It can’t all be just the creative. Oh, how I wish it could.

Good luck with your writing.

Carolyn Haines has over eighty published works under her belt including mysteries, thrillers, suspense, horror, gothic southern fiction, literary fiction, and nonfiction.

She’s received too many awards to mention including: The Harper Lee Award for Alabama's Distinguished Writer and the Eugene Current-Garcia Award for Alabama's Distinguished Literary Scholar.

The Alabama Library Association honored Carolyn Haines, a long-time assistant professor of creative writing at the University of South Alabama and an internationally recognized author, with its second Lifetime Achievement Award.

And in March of 2020, Carolyn was a 2020 inductee into the Alabama Writers Hall of Fame.