Science Fiction & Fantasy or Romance? You can't have both.

[JaclynDolamore]

I went and looked. It's kind of confusing, and I'm worried that it's expensive, but it's now on my list of things to figure out and try.

Feel free to PM me if you want me to walk you through it...I have a good idea of what might work for you because I expect we have a similar audience.

[KBoards.com]

[JaclynDolamore]

My point is, my books have enough SF to satisfy (apparently) traditional SF fans, but enough Romance to qualify me for RWA and make romance readers happy. But the road of the hybrid genre author is fraught with indecision and peril in marketing. It definitely isn't for the faint of heart.

What books are these? The good thing about this thread is I've been adding a lot to my TBR...! (now I just need more time to read...)

[Fel Beasley]

What books are these? The good thing about this thread is I've been adding a lot to my TBR...! (now I just need more time to read...)

Me too!

[suliabryon]

While I agree with much of what you say, you've got this part mixed up. PNR and UF parted ways a long time ago, and UF never required romance. I guarantee UF did not come later, it came first. Later, such authors as LKH and Jim Butcher introduced more sex, then more romance into their books. The big boom in PNR started with Moning and Twilight, JR Ward and Nalini Singh. Those are romances, not urban fantasy.

Let me rephrase. I was using UF as an example of what CAN be a very 50/50 genre split, and I would argue that the majority of the heavy hitters are UF w/romance - LKH, who broke out the genre in 1992 with her Anita Blake series, Ilona Andrews, Patricia Briggs, Kelley Armstrong, Jim Butcher (although he is a little less with the romance) and our own indie bestsellers like Annie Bellet and Jasmine Walt. Maybe it's just my reading habits, but I'm having a hard time thinking of as many non-romance UF bestsellers. I do know that UF existed long before LKH, but her success really made it a household name and started its path to being a hugely successful genre. PNR was already in existence in the 90's as well, with authors like Christine Feehan and Sherrylin Kenyon. Ward and the others came a few years later.

[suliabryon]

What books are these? The good thing about this thread is I've been adding a lot to my TBR...! (now I just need more time to read...)

I'll send you a PM. FeliciaBeasley - you actually already know me, you just don't realize it. I'll PM you as well!

[Fel Beasley]

I'll send you a PM. FeliciaBeasley - you actually already know me, you just don't realize it. I'll PM you as well!

That is both awesome and a little unsettling

[CoraBuhlert]

Content removed. I don't consent to the new TOS of 2018.

[Fishbowl Helmet]

Are we on the same planet?

It is a distinct possibility, though certainly not certain.

I have a library of SFF that fills a large room...

That's a good start. Well done you.

[Gentleman Zombie]

Don't know if this of interest of anyone... but I just sent an e-mail to Amazon and suggested they add the following romance sub-categories:

Romantic Heroes/Vampires
Romantic Heroes/Shifters
Romantic Heroes/Aliens

Romantic Themes/Futuristic
Romantic Themes/Space Travel
Romantic Themes/Galactic Empires
Romantic Themes/Post Apocalyptic
Romantic Themes/Dystopian

Not sure if others with to suggest as well... but it couldn't hurt to mention it. I did receive a note from Amazon thanking me for the suggestions and noting the request had been forwarded.

[mythsnake]

Couldn't hurt to send in the suggestion. I suggested to SFWA that they bring up the issue the next time the president talks with org's Amazon rep; don't know if she will, but maybe if SFWA and RWA get on board with pushing the suggestion, Amazon would be a little more willing to implement it, especially if authors have been sending in the same requests independently (and if readers do so as well, even better).

[ET]

It seems I've had some of the same problems searching Amazon as some of you folks have.

When looking for a classic fantasy or science fiction story I find the categories completely surrounded by bare torsos, shapeshifting, lover, billionaire, love stories.

It's really frustrating that romance genre stories have been allowed to flood almost every category to the point that it becomes very hard for people to find the non-romance books (in the non-romance) categories.

There is a similar situation with horror: Search for "vampire novels" on Amazon, and you get page after page of Twilight-esque vampire romances. You'll also get lots of "paranormal romance", which is very different from what Stephen King or Richard Matheson are about. There is even "werewolf romance" and "zombie romance" nowadays.

Given that the romance category is so broad, it seems more logical to create subcategories within romance (paranormal romance, SF romance, etc.) versus allowing romance to take over every other category of genre fiction.

[SC]

There is a similar situation with horror: Search for "vampire novels" on Amazon, and you get page after page of Twilight-esque vampire romances.

It's even harder for those of us who like vampires but are looking for something other than hard horror or typical vampire romance. My (unpublished) vampire book has elements of horror and romance in it, but isn't really either in terms of genre. I classify it as contemporary fantasy (not even urban fantasy, really, since it is set in a fairly small city and doesn't have a lot of typical urban fantasy elements--though that's probably where I'll end up putting it since Amazon seems to think urban fantasy and contemporary fantasy are the same thing).

I do hope SWFA and RWA talk to Amazon about this. I also really enjoy reading what y'all are calling hybrid stories (50/50 romance and SF/F), so forcing authors to choose one or the other is not the best solution, IMO.

[Taking my troll a$$ outta here]

I think the answer is not to turn on one another as authors but rather to turn to Amazon and ask them to solve this problem with honey: create a far wider range of subcategories for romance authors to use, so as to draw them back to romance. (And do the same for erotica.) There are already what looks like a good number, but I think they could easily be expanded tremendously. This is what's there now:



Looks good, right? They're obviously making an effort to help romance readers find what they want. But they could do so much more. How about letting shoppers select a much wider range of heat levels? How about way more settings? How about way more tropes? Mindy Klasky's list has 60 or 70, not 10. Why aren't SEALs an option under heroes? Or bear shifters? There's so much more they could do. If there were a subcat for dragon-shifter alien billionaire heroes, that's just where readers would look. They wouldn't look in sci-fi just because the hero is a dragon-shifter due to being an alien rather than because of magic.

I think Amazon should shoot for having no more than a thousand books in each terminal subcat. If a terminal subcat grows beyond that point, they should find a way to divide it. If historical > American > 19th century gets too big, divide it into
historical > American > 19th century > urban and
historical > American > 19th century > rural.
If historical > American > 19th century > rural gets too big, divide it into
historical > American > 19th century > rural > Great Plains,
historical > American > 19th century > rural > Rockies, and
historical > American > 19th century > rural > Gold Rush,
... or whatever works best. Authors would be able to target readers and get those coveted bestseller banners and readers could more easily find the books they want. Going back to limited each book to no more than two categories would encourage authors to select the subcats that best define their book, rather than casting the widest possible net.

I love that readers have these options to filter books. What I don't love is that authors do not have the power to place our books directly in those subcategories without some guessing game trying to make the correct key words with the proper genres, which doesn't always work. And then there are plenty of categories that we can't get books into, no matter what we do. If authors could just directly click on the subcats like the screenshots above, that would be a huge step in making things better.

[Mari Oliver]

The guessing game is highly annoying. After a couple days of trying to get the categories right for my fantasy romance novel, I finally had to email Amazon. They were great at fixing the problem but the time spent figuring this out could've added more words to the WIP.

[Gone To Croatan]

I love that readers have these options to filter books. What I don't love is that authors do not have the power to place our books directly in those subcategories without some guessing game trying to make the correct key words with the proper genres, which doesn't always work.

Yes. This is part of the problem: they should get rid of the whole 'magic keywords' thing and just let us pick a few categories, even if they restrict them to a few generic and related categories.

[KBoards.com]