What to Write (??)

May 10, 2008 | By Administrator In Writer's Life |

Ok, I must confess: I DO like SF/F, a little, but I’m not sure - even though that’s the genre of my novel that is completed - how much I should do on it.

Here’s why:

This is not really the genre I want to write.  I WANT to write literary fiction.

OK, now stop laughing.  I am 100% aware of the odds of making a living as a literary fiction author.

And my little story, which needs massive amounts of work, is good and deep and has lovely conflict, true growth and sacrifice in the protagonist, sequels which I like, and is possibly marketable.  It’s a story I like, and today a SF/F writer at a group I’m attending offered to help me with it.

Thanks to working full time and the commitment with my kids and also my own furthering of my education, the novel probably needs 10-12 months to get into shape, before I can start sending it out in this genre that I’m not too interested in.

This week, I subscribed to Holly Lisle’s newsletter, and her advice was  basically:
“Know thyself” (with regard to your genre)  Do the work of the genre you’re writing (world building), don’t skimp, don’t use stock medieval footage, and so on.  Write a genre you WANT to write.

A few paragraphs down she wrote:

Any book you write is going to be the first book of yours some reader picks up.

So what if I write a genre and then it’s the WRONG ONE?  What if I start publishing the short stories I’m considering writing (not even remotely fantastical) and then come out with fantasy novel and everyone’s like “huh?”.  Or will I be typecast and doomed to never publish in the genre I love?

FWIW, though my little novel in NO WAY resembles the greatness of these two books, two of my favorite SF/F books are by authors NOT in that genre:

“The Time Travellers Wife” and
“The Sparrow”

It’s a lot to think about, because THEN it means I don’t even have a novel together…well, ok, not completely true, I do have another thing I’ve been working on, but it’s no where NEAR complete, nor can it remotely compete with my latest ideas.

AUGH.   I guess no One ever said this would be easy…

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3 Comments so far

  1. Katrina Stonoff on May 11th, 2008

    Write what you long to write. Life’s too short to write something only because it’s marketable.

    I find it helpful to also look at what you like to read. You need to read in your genre, and you will write best what you read most.

    Good luck!

  2. Pam on May 12th, 2008

    Write what you love. (Or put another way, write the book you want to read.) The rest will come together as it should.

  3. Ilana on May 13th, 2008

    Pam said it. Is this book that you’ve written one you would pick up off the shelf and take home yourself?

    And if you want to change genres, well, you can just come up with another pen name and try again.

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