 Genres are boxes. Imagine you are a bookseller, and have a stack of books to organize on your store’s shelves. Each shelf is labeled with a genre: horror, romance, fantasy, thriller, literary fiction, and so on. Now and then, you may find a book that doesn’t fit neatly into a shelf. It is horror but set in space. You’ve got a sci-fi horror novel on hands. Where do you shelve it? Horror or science fiction? You need to choose. Who is the most likely to enjoy this book? Sci-fi readers or horror readers? Now, the good thing about being a writer is that you aren’t a bookseller. You don’t need to choose what box to put your book into when you are writing it. Of course, at some point you will have to ask yourself how to market your book to a literary agent, a publisher, or a reader, and the genre(s) of the book will matter. But when you are still alone in front of your draft? Forget the box.  Photography by Thomas Cateau Focus on the story you want to tell. When my spouse finished reading the first draft of my hard-to-categorize novella Bright City, Shattered, he asked me if Bright City was set in a far-future post-apocalyptic setting, or in a secondary world. My answer? “I don’t know. Who cares?” Then, what about luma, the fictional energy source used to generate electricity for the city, and the enmagineers manipulating it? Is it technology or magic? Are enmagineers technologists or magicians? My answer? “I don’t know. Both? Again, who cares?” Readers, indeed, did not seem to care, as they enjoyed my novella without being bothered by these elements being unclear, undefined, outside of a box. The best way to describe this novella is speculative mystery, because the plot is a murder mystery, and the setting a retro-futuristic city with speculative magitech. But “speculative” isn’t a great BISAC category, so for the sake of marketing and reaching the right readers, my publisher and I agreed to categorize it as a sci-fi mystery. Here I blended three genres: fantasy, science fiction, mystery, and perhaps even more. I didn’t care about any of this when I wrote this novella. I had the idea of this fictional city, this fictional technology, these characters, and a story happening to them. Nothing else mattered. The outcome? One of my best pieces of fiction, according to several of my readers.  Buy Millie's new release: https://tinyurl.com/bde4j9fx A science-fantasy inspired by Charles Perrault's fairy tale "Peau d'Âne," The Color of Time blends the whimsy of classic fairy tales with the sapphic romance of Fable for the End of the World and the large-scale politics of The Mercy of Gods. Princess Cyrelle has always been faithful and true to her family, country, and Goddess. But now her brother, King Elias of Cicia, has asked for-no, commanded-her hand in marriage. Desperate to avoid this incestuous union, Cyrelle requests a series of increasingly impossible gifts and petitions the Goddess for a sign to sway her resolute brother's proposal. As Elias persists undeterred, Cyrelle must risk everything to escape the only life she's ever known. So here is my key piece of advice: if you want to write an original story that blends genres, forget the boxes, forget the genres, just write your story. Don’t try to shape it in a particular way so it can nearly fit a box or even two. Let it take its own shape. Let it be unconventional. Let it be weird. Of course, it is possible to take the opposite approach: pick two (or more) genres and decide to mash them up. I am not a fan of this approach, as it can sometimes feel forced. If you still choose to do this, don’t try to even perfectly the genres. Say you want to write historical fantasy. There is no obligation for the historical aspect of the book and the fantasy to be 50/50. Depending on the needs of your story, maybe the historical aspect will take 80% of the focus of the book, and fantasy will “only” be 20%, by having a simple magic system that doesn’t influence the characters’ actions at every twist and turn. Or it could be the opposite: the historical aspect of your book is mostly here as a back setting, but the story will focus a lot more on the magic or supernatural creatures or whatever fantastical element you have in your book. And even if after you’re done drafting your book, you realize there isn’t “enough” magic to call it a historical fantasy, or the historical aspect of your book isn’t faithful enough to actual historical events, don’t panic. Labels you had in mind may not apply anymore, but it doesn’t mean you failed. It means you wrote the story as it needed to be written. You let it grow and take its own natural shape.  Photography by Noah Buscher Here is my last piece of advice: if you want to “add” a popular genre to the one you usually write, start by reading books in this genre. It can be tempting to explore a genre you aren’t familiar with by blending it with one you have been writing in for a long time, but if you don’t do your homework (i.e. reading books in that genre), it will show. This is something I have noticed a lot in romantasy, on both ends of the spectrum. Fantasy authors not understanding the conventions of the romance genre and missing half of the beats such a story requires to delight its devoted readers. Worst offense: no HEA, not even an HFN. Then, romance authors not understanding what worldbuilding is and ending up with a theme park for their romance that will have fantasy readers yawn while they wait for the fantasy to actually fantasy. The best romantasy cares as much about the romance as it cares about the fantasy. It is true about all other genre blends. Even if your genre split isn’t 50/50, you still need to be familiar with all the genres present in your story and to care genuinely about them.
Now, if you can’t do justice to both genres, and your story still took the shape it needed to take, this is fine. Simply don’t mismarket it. For example, my novel A Legacy of Blood and Bone is a blend of historical fiction and fantasy with a romantic subplot. When I started writing it, I wanted to write the perfect blend of historical fiction, fantasy, and romance, but I ended up with a fantasy-driven story and a romantic subplot. The love story is there, and I give my characters a lovely HFN, but I cannot market this book as a romance, because the romance isn’t prominent enough to make it a perfect blend of the three genres. It isn’t a historomantasy (yes, I just made up this word), and it’s okay. There are plenty of readers who enjoy historical fantasy with a romantic subplot, and there will be plenty who will enjoy your genre blend, no matter how weirdly your story is shaped.
A non-exhaustive list of Millie’s favorite genre-blend novels to inspire your own writing:
 This post was composed by Millie Abecassis, an author of speculative fiction represented by A.J. Van Belle at the Booker Albert Literary Agency. She is the author of the novel A Legacy of Blood and Bone, a fantasy set in an alternate Belle Époque France brimming with intrigue, dangerous magic, and a swooning, slow-burn sapphic romance. Her most recent books are The Seventh Sister, a horrific retelling of “Snow White” and “Bluebeard” set in a fantastical world, and The Color of Time, a science-fantasy retelling of “Donkeyskin” with Dune influences and a hopepunk vibe.  Attend a Writers Conference in 2026:
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