Is genre ever relevant to the writing process?
I'm a strong believer in genre being largely a thing that's used for marketing, an easy shorthand for book stores to know where to place your book and sell it better. It's also, unfortunately, a shorthand for critics who are predisposed to hating certain stories for surface traits without going to the effort of complicated things like 'thematic analysis' or 'reading the book'.
I tend to believe that a writer should write what they want to write without heed for genre conventions, simply telling the story of their soul (to the best of their ability and after refinement) and worrying about the genre and the marketing later.
However, I'm open to the idea that this ethos could be wrong. Are there any case that you guys can think of where adherence to a genre can or should affect the creative processes of a writer?
By writing process, yes, I mean the whole shebang. Plotting, characterisation, outlining, thematic elements; anything associated with the process, can or should it be affected by someone shoehorning themselves into a genre? When is this useful? Does doing so have artistic integrity? Do you think Agatha Christie sat down and said 'oh, the readers wouldn't expect this in a mystery, I shouldn't include it' when writing?
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You seem to be looking at picking a genre as signing up to follow a very tight straight-jacket on your writing. I don't believe that's what genre is at all. Rather, genre is a very loose set of related tropes and expectations, and as long as you don't break too many of those tropes and expectations without good reason, there's a ton of room for innovation.
Harry Potter is an interesting example. In terms of genre, it is an extremely straightforward fantasy young adult series. In fact, by going out of its way to incorporate as many sterotypical depictions of magic as possible, it leans into its genre very heavily. However, within that genre, it still does several things that are innovative and fresh. One major example is that the books start out very light-hearted but become darker and more mature as the series progresses. As a result, as the children who were introduced to the series grew up, the franchise continuously matched their level of maturity. I sometimes hear people talking about the books "growing up" with them as they got older. This is a genuinely artistic and unique structure for the franchise to take on. And it was completely possible even within the limits of following the expectations of genre fiction to a tee.
And no one is requiring you to adhere closely to a genre. There are many stories that don't fit neatly into genres or push their genres' boundaries. Artemis Fowl seemlessly mixes young adult, fantasy, sci-fi, and heist fiction together. Frozen and Kingsman: The Secret Service are strict genre movies that knowingly deconstruct their respective genres. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and the Rimworld franchises are deeply irreverent takes on sci-fi and fantasy that avoid the serious gravity that those genres usually strive to attain. Avengers: Infinity War hits every single blockbuster superhero movie trope in the book while still having a genuinely experimental structure that manages a cast of characters so expansive that it would normally be a huge impediment to a story and a plot that thematically treats the antagonist as the hero.
Ultimately, the individual tropes you use are not going to be what makes your story artistic or samey. It's the intelligence and depth of your characters, plot structure, and themes. These elements are what are emotionally resonant - and they are completely independent of genre. Consider that Romeo and Juliet and Westside Story have almost exactly the same characters, plot arc, and theme but wildly different genres.
If you focus on writing an excellent story by getting the narrative elements solidly nailed down, your story will be artistic and powerful whether it strictly adheres to genre or not.
In the end, as with any other element of a story, how you choose to relate to your chosen genre is a decision with no straightforward answer that changes from story to story. I suggest you don't look at it as a straightjacket where you have to fulfill certain reader expectations. Rather, it's a tool where many different approaches are valid, and finding the right approach for your story is the goal. And whatever you ultimately go with, your decision is still largely orthogonal to the other decisions you have to make with your story, leaving you with plenty of artistic freedom regardless of genre.
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In addition to the other answers, consider that specific genres may have additional requirements which will impact your storytelling. Not because of tropes, but by their very definition.
An obvious example would be "Play Fair" Mysteries, which have a built-in requirement that the reader has all necessary clues to solve the puzzle before the solution is revealed. So you have to keep that in mind, because if you don't then you're no longer in that genre.
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While I get with what you are saying, and I deeply agree, sometimes genre conventions can be useful.
If you want to tell a story - let's say, featuring a distant future and space-travel - you don't have to adhere to sci-fi conventions; mainly because genre conventions are, in a way, like a set of more commonly used "tropes". As a writer, everyone should be able to play around with the tropes he likes freely, and let the marketing people deal with the rest. If you feel like there should be dragons in your story (along with space travel) you should totally add them, even if they don't fall in the sci-fi main scope.
As you mention, genres shouldn't be taken as fixed sets of rules that everyone must follow - that's just plainly wrong. They're more like loosely relevant tags to quickly categorize fiction.
But if you feel that you want to write something of a specific genre, let's say, a romantic story, you may want to look at other works for reference. In this scenario, having a "genre" in mind helps in searching what other writers have done (following the rule that reading is a crucial part of getting a better writer).
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You must comply, resistance is futile.
It is precisely because genres are used to sell books that you should be very much aware of what is expected within the genre you write.
You need to tell your agent what you wrote, they expect you to give them a genre, or perhaps a twist on a genre: "Magic in modern high-tech urban setting."
They expect you to define an audience, young adult, new adult, etc.
Although you can write about a third of the story before deciding on these things, you should decide what your genre is, who your audience is, and revise what you've got to match it. If you have an explicit or strongly implied sex scene, you are new adult or adult. You are not young adult. If the rest of your story feels "young adult", delete the sex scene, it doesn't belong here.
Your agent, and your publisher, and bookstores, and online sites, need to know where to shelve your book, to reach your audience.
The agent will read your book, and reject it if you have violated genre norms without very early warning. If she doesn't know how to shelve it, she won't bother trying, there are 99 other people she can represent instead.
The same goes for the publisher; (and likely the agent won't even try a publisher if the book can't be categorized, because she doesn't want to ruin her relationship with them; they are trusting her to bring the good stuff, not problems). The bookstores in this venture don't want to take returns from pissed off customers, but they will and charge them back to the publisher, and eventually to you. And then the bookstore managers aren't dumb, they don't want any more of your books, and make a note that the publisher tried to sneak one past them.
That's the way the world works; when you are a multi-million bestseller, your name alone will sell your books, and you can step off genre as you wish. Agents, publishers, bookstores and your fans will give you some rope.
In the meantime, write what you will, but early on decide how you (or your partners in this venture, the agent, publisher and bookstore) are going to market it to an avid fan section. That, as you already know, means picking a genre. There is plenty of room for creativity and invention within a genre, they are very general, but you have to stick to the general rules. Put on the handcuffs! If you write a Romance, it must have a happy ending, that is what your readers expect, and unless you are a proven bestseller, your agent and publisher won't consider anything else for the Romance section. Period.
You must comply, resistance is futile.
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