Fantasy Romantic Suspense... Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Funky new subgenre-or did I just forget a comma?

I was boxing up some slightly-loved books this week. Since these are books I bought, there are only two genres represented: Fantasy, and Romantic-Suspense.

The fact that these are my two favourite genres always seemed rather freakish to me. Like Peanut butter & applesauce, or chocolate & potato chips. They're my favourites, but I couldn't really imagine them together.

Only, now I'm starting to realise that they aren't, really, that disparate. I love romantic-suspense (or, suspense with romantic elements) because there's almost always that moment of "oooh, I did NOT see that coming." And I love that. That's the big hook for me in a book, movie or tv show. And, go figure, the fantasy I choose to read gives me that Moment, too. Some surprise that I didn't foresee that makes me sit up straighter and read a little faster.

And any of the fantasy books I really truly adore have romantic elements. My favourite fantasy book, in fact, has political uprising and spies in disguise...Until I mention that the king can do magic, I could summarise the book as a rom-susp.

This past month, I've been working on two manuscripts: you guessed it: one rom-susp, one fantasy with romantic elements.

Once I started meeting other writers, I began realising that a lot of them had the same two genres on their shelves as I have on mine. Fantasy and rom-susp. So, I've looked at the WIPs and ideas that have hit me in the last little while, and I've decided to take a gamble and try to write a Fantasy-Romantic-Suspense. (which will probably be billed as a 'romantic suspense with paranormal elements.') Only instead of shifters or witches, I'll be using Elves and goblins.

Has anyone seen that sort of thing before? Have I somehow missed out on a book that already combines my favorites? Please let me know if you've seen it! And let me know if you have two books in your collection that surprise you by sitting comfortably side by side, despite their disparities...