RITA ® Award-Winning Author of Fantasy Romance
//A story about how Romance continues to be treated like antimatter in some parts of the SFF community. Also, exciting news on ONEIRA, and a bit more about agents and being careful who you pitch to.
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This week at the SFF Seven, we’re asking: “Do you read in the genre you write?”
What’s funny is that my answer is absolutely yes – but that I didn’t always write in the genre I read. Does that make sense?
I have always read Fantasy and Science Fiction, since I was a little kid, and I’ve been reading Romance since I was old enough to walk to the used bookstore to buy my own books, as my mom wouldn’t let me read “that trash.” (Because she thought Romance was low-brow and anti-feminist, not because of the sex.) But when I started out as a writer, I wrote Creative Nonfiction.
Some of this was timing and coincidence. When I decided I wanted to be a writer instead of a scientist, one of the first classes I took was “Essays on Self and Place,” from a visiting writer at the university. I fell easily into writing essays and had success with them. My first book was an essay collection. And, sure, I read some essays. I read a lot of essay collections and memoir. But I was always reading them as research and reciprocity.
All that time, what I read for pure enjoyment? Anything with a paranormal/SFF element and plenty of Romance.
It was only after my first book came out that a friend – a bookseller who knew my tastes and sold me hardcover releases of JD Robb, Laurell K. Hamilton, Stephenie Meyer, and Jaqueline Carey – asked me why I wasn’t writing in the genres I so clearly loved to read.
Funny that. It simply hadn’t occurred to me. But then I started to, I wrote this Fantasy Romance* (not a genre then, but what did I know??) that was SO MUCH FREAKING FUN TO WRITE. I couldn’t believe how much more fun I had writing my crazy tale about a scientist who falls into Faerie, becomes a sorceress, and ends up in a bargain with a fae lord to bear his child. I even got a really nice rejection on the book from Stephenie Meyer’s agent! (Though it took a long time for me to sell it, which is another tale.)
The rest is history. ~ Waves at catalogue of Epic Fantasy Romances ~ I haven’t looked back. Writing what I love to read has absolutely been a great decision.
*The book that became ROGUE’S PAWN
//A dive into genre today, along with a discussion of whether there’s an identifiable plot arc for Science Fiction or Fantasy (hint: there isn’t), and what I’ve recently discovered about writing a Romance.
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//The upside of me not being in San Diego on June 1 is that my event at Mysterious Galaxy will be available to all of you via Zoom! Would love if you all joined in!
Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is Names: What’s your favorite source/method for naming your characters, places, etc? Come on over to learn my secrets.
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So, I’ve mentioned on my podcast, First Cup of Coffee, that I like listening to L. Penelope’s podcast, My Imaginary Friends. (Our podcasts are also part of the Frolic Podcast Network, but we listened to each other before that.) On this week’s episode, Making an Impact, she talks about her experiences on panels at a recent convention. I tell you, folks, I was gaping at the speakers when she said the other panelists had said that the Fantasy genre is inherently politically conservative – and no one challenged it.
People: I SO want to challenge this assertion!
Apparently the thought process is that Fantasy often involves the trope of restoring the One True Thing in some sense. Defeating the Big Bad to restore the Time Before. The Chosen One appearing to usher in a time of peace and plenty. The recovery of magic or something else that has been lost.
I’m sure you all can recognize these themes.
First of all, I want to point out that this is a pretty narrow conception of what the Fantasy genre encompasses. I mean, yes, there are people who equate “Fantasy” with “Tolkien.” People have said exactly this to me. Never mind that Tolkien was writing a hundred years ago, so that’s akin to saying they equate Science Fiction with Fritz Leiber, Jr. and Isaac Asimov. Sure, all of these authors made substantial contributions to the SFF genres, but there’s been movement since then.
A lot of the time, when people say “Fantasy,” they do mean Tolkienesque epic fantasy – including all those writers who’ve followed that path. It’s a grand tradition, but it’s not the only tradition. The writers who keep to that fairly narrow interpretation of fantasy, who write only pastoral, non-tech, peaceful-farmers-are-pure-of-heart tales might be conservative. I dunno. I think the writer brings their values to the story, regardless of genre.
Fantasy is a broad genre with many themes. There are a LOT of people writing it who very much do not have conservative values.
Second, I don’t think there’s ANYTHING inherently politically conservative about the concept of creating peace and plenty, of overthrowing an oppressor. Our current political situation speaks to that. The avowed conservatives in power may give lip service to “family values” and “making things great AGAIN,” but a totalitarian government is exactly that – and resisting can be an act of rebellion. Fantasy absolutely takes on these themes. For example, my Forgotten Empires books (see? even the series title speaks to something lost) tell of people laboring under an oppressive empire. They rebel, eventually and in their own ways, but that recovery of what’s been lost is hardly an expression of conservative values. Those are radical and dangerous choices. And, yes, those stories are absolutely part of my personal response to an authoritarian government that serves only the rich – and part of my resistance to that.
I’d argue that the best Fantasy takes on sweeping political change.
There’s a lot more to the enormous and varied Fantasy genre than Tolkien and farm boys called to be the Chosen One. Let’s make some noise about it.