Book Genres

I had just finished reading the book “The Three-Body Problem”. I found it to be very imaginative. So why am I not that excited to read the second book, “The Dark Forest”?

Ever since I have enjoyed science and science fiction. That got me to thinking back to the books I have read. “A Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice and Fire” by George Martin or more popularly known as “A Game of thrones”, The lord of the rings, The chronicles of Thomas covenant to name a few. I was always excited to go on and read the next chapter, the next book in the series.

Could it be I was more interested in “science fiction fantasy” stories vs just straight “science fiction”? But isn’t science fiction, by definition fantasy? Maybe I should start by getting my genres right. And so I compiled in this article the most common story genres. Keep in mind this is not a very exhaustive list. I’ve seen some list up to 21 genres, but if one should so desire,I am sure we could find subcategories of subcategories to come up with more. In fact, according to Reedsy.com, Amazon has over 16,000.

Why should you be familiar with book genres?

People have different reasons for wanting to know more about book genres. Knowing the genres of the books and stories you enjoy will help you narrow down your search to related books of the same or similar genres. This can help save you both time and money searching for that next great story.

If you are into writing, then knowing your genre can help you promote your book to the correct audience. Again, this saves you both time and money.

Categories

There are two major categories, and every story will fall into one of these. I will only list those categories that currently interest me. There are plenty of resources out there if you want to find more subcategories of subcategories if you are interested.

  • Non-Fiction – These are your news stories, events, historical events, autobiography. Basically, these are stories or narrations of actual events.
    • Art and Photography – Another Self explanatory genre
    • Food and Drink – Self explanatory
    • Humor
    • How-To-Guides / Do-It-Yourself (DIY)
    • Science and Technology
    • Travel
  • Fiction – Maybe based on non-fictional events. These derive from the imagination of the writer or writers and storytellers.
    • Fantasy – Includes elements of magic or the supernatural
    • Graphic Novels – Comics, Manga. Rich blend of story and visuals.
    • Historical Fiction – Fiction that blends historical figures and events into the story.
    • Science Fiction – Main element is real or almost genuine science and technology. Mostly mostly in futuristic.
    • Short Story – Shorter than novels

As mentioned earlier, you can have as few (fiction, non-fiction) or as many genres as you want. Amazon already lists over 16,000 and as of this writing, they may have even more. The goal of knowing your Genres, or at least those that interest you, is to save time and money in selecting books and stories to read, write or follow.

© 2021, Norman Talon. All rights reserved.

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