Monday, July 29, 2013

Ranking Genres

What genres do you like to read? I used to say I’d read anything, but that’s not really true. Here’s how I would rank them in order of preference (meaning if I had books in all of these categories (and I do), which one I would most likely read first):

1. Paranormal romance

2. Romantic suspense

3. Suspense/Thriller

4. Urban Fantasy

5. Paranormal/Horror

6. Contemporary romance

7. Historical romance

8. Sci-Fi romance

No straight fantasy or science fiction on that list. No siree. And I’m really picky about sci-fi romance. Horror moved down quite a bit, which kind of surprised me. Used to be all I ever read was Stephen King and Dean Koontz. Not so much anymore. I love romance, but not just romance. I’d rather have other stuff involved than just internal conflicts. I’m not all that crazy about the couples hating one another (and if they do, it better not last long).

Of course, a favorite author will bump any genre down the list, and I have lots of favorites!

I’ve told you about needing to delete 10,000 words from BITE ME, I’M YOURS. Well, I managed to hack off over 7,500. My estimation was 5,000, so it’s nice I under estimated. Still, it would have been nice if I had managed to reach that magical 10,000-word mark. I’ll read through it one more time (later on this week) and hope I didn't screw it up too much.

So…how do you rank your genres? Or do you go strictly by authors?

 

Stacy

 

8 comments:

JeffO said...

Hmm. I'm not sure I can rank them. I suppose what I read most would be categorized as contemporary fiction, with a literary slant, and I'll dabble around other areas like suspense/mystery, dystopia, I don't know what else.

As for favorite authors, I'll read most everything Stephen King puts out (How's Joyland so far? I haven't gotten it yet), and I've been reading a lot of Chris Bohjalian lately, but I mostly go by what looks interesting as opposed to by author.

Maria Zannini said...

My favorites are historical romance, paranormal romance, and SF romance.

Congrats on chopping 7500 words. That's a great accomplishment in so short a time!

Stacy McKitrick said...

Jeff - Joyland is okay. I'm about half-way through and waiting for the blurb to take affect. I don't think any newbie author could get away with that!

Maria - Re: chopping, I shocked myself, too. Don't know if the changes make the story stronger. I sure hope they do. Won't know until I read it over again, I suppose.

Jennette Marie Powell said...

I probably put PNR first, along with scifi romance (including time travel) and fantasy romance. Can't really distinguish between any of those to vastly favor one. Then would probably be historical romance, romantic suspense, straight fantasy, scifi, and mystery suspense. I do like other things, but those make up the bulk of my reading. Good luck with Bite Me!

Stacy McKitrick said...

Jennette - The good luck must have worked. She said she'd read it (just can't offer a contract with it over 100,000). One step at a time, right?

LD Masterson said...

Well, mystery/suspense is my favorite. A paranormal element is fine but no vampires or zombies please. And I always like a bit of romance.

Stacy McKitrick said...

LD - No vampires? Say it ain't so! :)

I'm not a huge mystery fan. In fact, the ONLY straight mystery books I read are from authors I know personally.

The Happy Whisk said...

I can't say as mostly I read cookery and whole foods books. But if I am reading, it's funny kid's books all the way.