Genres Are Hard
Genres are hard. Other people might not think so, but they are for me. But from what I’ve seen from the literary world, they are very important. But as an author, not so much.
I had a hard time figuring out what genre my story was part of. It has a bunch of elements to it: suspense, thriller, drama, and a dash of romance, but what genre do I label it as? I had no clue.
I played around with the idea of a thriller or suspense, but my opening was too slow for this concept. It did not grab the reader, so if they came in with the expectation of this, I lost them in the first chapter. Someone suggested that I go to a bookstore and study the titles in the various genres, but that’s no so easy during the time of quarantines. And I could not think of a comprehensive title.
And then a comp title hit me in the face. And it was so obvious that I wondered how I missed it all this time.
All throughout my writing, I kept coming back to two titles: Shawshank Redemption and Unbroken (the Louis Zamparini story). Yet neither of those are YA titles, which is the age group that I am writing for. So, I kept listing the Hunger Games and Maze Runner due to their gritty/dark settings and events. I literally had a facepalm moment when I figured out that Shawshank and Unbroken were my comp titles. Duh.
So for those out there struggling with the same issue: what story keeps coming to mind as you write your novels? Are there any scenes/situations that inspire you? My story is not historical fiction nor related to war or even adults, but many of the theme and the setting are the same.
I have now re-written my query letter and relaunched it. Hopefully it will do better. Only time will tell.
If/when I get a positive response from a query letter, I’ll write a post about what I learned, what worked, and what didn’t.