Genre Choices in Publishing

Strategic Decisions About Your Creative World

Genre selection is not just about labeling your book; it’s about understanding your audience, the market, and where your book fits within that. It’s about making strategic decisions that can propel your book to success. So, let’s unpack this and delve deeper into why genre matters, how to understand the market, and how to align your passion with profit.

Why Genre Matters

Some might argue that genre is just a label, a box that confines creativity. But in the world of self-publishing, genre is more than just a label—it’s a roadmap to success. It guides readers to our books, helps us stand out in a crowded marketplace, and can even influence the profitability of our work.

Choosing the right genre is like choosing the right location for a brick-and-mortar store. You wouldn’t open a high-end jewelry store in a rundown neighborhood, would you? Similarly, your book needs to be in a genre where your target readers are most likely to find it. It’s about positioning your book in a place where it can shine, where it can reach its potential readers, and where it can make the most impact.

Moreover, genre helps set reader expectations. When readers pick up a mystery novel, they expect a certain level of suspense, a plot twist, and a satisfying resolution. If your book delivers on these expectations, you’ll have satisfied readers who are likely to come back for more. If not, you risk disappointing your readers and losing potential future sales.

Understanding the Market

Before we can choose the right genre, we need to understand the market. This means not just knowing what genres are popular, but understanding why they’re popular and who their readers are. This requires a bit of detective work, but the insights we gain can be invaluable.

For instance, romance novels consistently top the charts in terms of sales. But within the romance genre, there are numerous sub-genres, each with its own dedicated fanbase. Understanding these nuances can help us position our book for maximum visibility and profitability.

It’s also important to keep an eye on emerging trends. Genres are not static; they evolve over time. What’s popular today might not be popular tomorrow. By staying abreast of market trends, we can anticipate shifts in reader preferences and position our books accordingly.

Aligning Passion with Profit

Choosing a genre solely based on market trends might seem like a smart business move. But as Lifers, we know that writing is more than just a business—it’s a passion. So, how do we reconcile the need for profitability with our passion for storytelling?

The answer lies in finding the intersection between what we love to write and what readers love to read. This sweet spot is where we can create work that not only sells well but also fulfills us creatively. It’s about finding a genre that resonates with us, that excites us, and that allows us to express our unique voice and perspective.

Remember, writing should be a joy, not a chore. If you’re passionate about your genre, that passion will shine through in your writing and captivate your readers. And when you love what you write, writing doesn’t feel like work—it feels like play. And that’swhen the magic happens.

Experiment and Evolve

Finally, remember that choosing a genre isn’t a one-time decision. As we grow and evolve as writers, our genre preferences might change too. Don’t be afraid to experiment with different genres and see what resonates with you and your readers.

Perhaps you started out writing fantasy but find yourself drawn to mystery. Or maybe you’ve been writing romance but are itching to try your hand at science fiction. That’s okay. In fact, it’s more than okay—it’s a sign of growth. As writers, we should always be pushing our boundaries, exploring new territories, and challenging ourselves.

Remember, the goal isn’t to chase trends but to create a sustainable writing career that brings us joy and financial success. And choosing the right genre is a big step in that direction.

Quantum States

by

Michaelbrent Collings

No one knew what had happened to Devlin. And no one knew what to do about that fact, either.

It had happened before, sure, but not like this, and not at this level. Usually when someone just went AWOL it turned out to be one of the interns, or someone on the custodial staff. Just some low-level person who decided it wasn’t worth the work-study credits or the minimum wage; not even worth the trouble of giving two weeks’ notice or even calling in to say, “I quit!” It was a paperwork hassle, because there were always a few documents that had to be signed, and it was harder to do that when the person involved was actively shirking.

But this wasn’t some low-level nobody. This was Devlin. Devlin, who was so high up the chain that most people couldn’t see him with a telescope. Devlin, who was working on things so bleeding-edge you’d need a brain tourniquet to understand them.

Devlin, who was just… gone.

Calls were made. Someone went by his house. Someone else went to his second house. Both were empty.

First, the company called the cops. Then, when the cops found nothing, they called Charlie Walker. Because that’s what you did when there was a company problem, and no one knew what to do: you called Charlie.

Charlie was the guy who fixed things that no one could fix.

Charlie started by following the same procedure he always followed: he went over everything that had already been done, and did it again. He called it Occam’s Scissors. Blade one: when faced with a mystery, the simplest choice was usually correct. Blade two: when faced with an unsolved mystery, chances are good someone actually did solve it, but was too dumb to realize it.

This time, Occam’s Scissors failed to cut. Charlie didn’t find anything more than had already been found, which was precisely zero. And, he couldn’t blame the people who’d gone before him, either: there was so much secrecy about Devlin’s current project that it got in the way of everything. Every party interviewed had to be vetted by the company’s lawyers, every piece of evidence had to go through an alphabet soup of corporate organizations—from UI/UX to DevOps to HR.

It was weird. Weirder still that, while no one knew what Devlin had been working on (at least, not precisely), they all knew “it would change everything.” That it was big, big, big.

Still, all the frustration with red tape and ignorant witnesses finally bore fruit. That was another of Charlie’s axioms: keep trying, because results follow effort. He dug in deep, searching for any clue of Devlin’s whereabouts, and eventually ferreted out something no one knew about: the beach house.

It was small, but nice. A single-story dwelling on a stretch of beach that no one ever visited, partly because it was privately-owned (by a company that was a shell for a company that was a shell for a company that was a shell for Devlin himself), but mostly because it was a royal pain to get to. Charlie parked his car at the end of a dirt road, pressed the power button to kill the engine. Then it was a mile of hiking through brush, down steep trails hacked into the sides of hilly terrain, then more brush that emptied out in front of the house.

***

Devlin’s two “official” houses were mansions, each one loaded to the gills with the latest tech and the most comfortable furnishings. They looked like something you might find Bill Gates hanging at on weekends, with everything networked and talking to you. Charlie knew this because he’d been to both as he searched for Devlin. In one, the fridge let him know—loudly and firmly—that the milk inside it had gone bad. In the other, the toilet asked if he’d had “a pleasant experience.”

Devlin’s unofficial house was nothing like that. Just a simple, one-story clapboard house that hunkered a hundred feet out of the brush and two hundred feet back from where the sea crashed against the shore. Charlie had thought about having the local cops check the place, but figured he’d be better off asking his gramma to do it. She was dead, so she wouldn’t have gotten any results, but at least she wouldn’t mess up any evidence, which he figured the local cops definitely would do.

So it was just him. Just Charlie, the company Mr. Fixit, who walked up to the front door. Just him, who looked around before entering. Just him, who saw nothing to indicate that Devlin would be here. Climbing down here had taken longer than he expected, so it was already dark enough out that any light in the house would have been easy to spot.

But the house was dark. No movement, no Devlin.

Charlie was thorough. He intended to check this place from top to bottom. Devlin wasn’t here, but that didn’t mean there’d be nothing of Devlin here. This was just one more link in a chain that would lead to Charlie doing what he always did: finding the answers. Fixing the problem.

He walked up to the porch. Houses with people had a feel to them, a subliminal sense of being occupied. This house was empty; he knew it before he knocked. But Charlie left no stone unturned. So he knocked, knocked again. Waited. Knocked one last time.

Full dark now.

He pulled out a small Maglite from an inner pocket, swiping the beam from left to right, right to left. He walked around the house twice, looking for signs of habitation or alarm. He saw neither. He debated calling in his findings (or lack thereof), but decided against it. First, because he had nothing to report. Second, because he didn’t want to tell the folks back at the office that he was likely stuck here until morning, because no way he could find his way back to the car in the dark.

He reversed his grip on the light, then used the butt-end of it to smash in a windowpane on the front door. He fumbled around inside, finding the latch. Click. He went in.

It was dark, which he expected. But when he flicked the light switch, no lights blazed. Charlie cursed under his breath. He had a flashlight and spare batteries—he was a prepared guy, everyone knew that—but he didn’t relish looking around for clues in the dead of night. Maybe he should just find a bed and hit the sack until morning, then resume.

And if the place is wired? he thought. If there’s an alarm going out now?

No, he wasn’t going to sit around. He came to look, so he’d look.

The front room held little: a couch, a fireplace. One side led to a kitchen/dining room. He moved in that direction and wrinkled his nose when a foul smell hit him. It smelled of rot, of dankness, of things left untended in the dark.

The smell worsened as he approached the refrigerator. He swung it open and had to concentrate on not vomiting. He shone the light, half expecting to find Devlin’s decomposing remains, but the beam just illuminated piles of things that had once been food before the mold-to-nutrition ratio switched over to the wrong side.

“Do you have anything to eat?”

Charlie shouted in surprise and spun around. His feet tangled, tripping him, and the flashlight dropped from his hand. The beam flipped and danced as the Maglite bounced around the floor. The light carved the darkness in all the worst ways, illuminating everything, clarifying nothing. Bright and dark mixed together and created chaos.

Then the beam stopped turning. The Maglite came to rest at the feet of…something. Charlie saw a momentary flash. A filthy, hulking form. Then the flashlight turned off and the darkness was absolute.

Charlie realized he was on his side, his hip throbbing from where he’d hit it against the floor, one hand raised up to ward off whatever had spoken. He felt ridiculous—it was a man who’d spoken, not some unnamed and unnamable thing in the night. Just a man. Maybe even Devlin.

But he couldn’t move. He remained as he was, frozen in terror, ready to be consumed by darkness, madness, death.

Nothing made a sound. Whatever had touched him—

(Whoever touched you, Charlie; get a grip!)

—remained where it was. Charlie could sense it, there near him, waiting to reach out, to take him, to feed.

But it didn’t happen. He realized the darkness wasn’t absolute. Enough of the moonlight outside penetrated the room to allow for sight as his eyes acclimated. He looked around, expecting to see whatever—

(Whoever!)

—had touched him looming only inches away.

But there was no one there. Nothing there.

Charlie lowered his hand. He sat up, and almost got hit in the face by the hand that was outstretched toward him. He cringed—there hadn’t been anyone there a moment ago, had there?

There was. There’s someone there now, so there was someone there a second ago, Charlie. Pull it together.

“Sorry,” said the same voice that had frightened him.

Charlie followed the hand to an arm, the arm to a body. The arm was wearing a dress shirt that was splotched and stained with odd patches visible even in the near-dark. It was open at the neck, and misbuttoned halfway down so that a large gap showed through to the flesh beneath. The flesh was so sallow and pale it nearly glowed.

Above the shirt: a few weeks’ worth of matted beard, a face streaked with filth, haunted eyes. The beard was new, and Charlie had never seen the man dirty like this—either in life or in pictures—but he knew who it was.

“Devlin,” he breathed. He reached up and took the man’s hand, his sudden relief so full that he didn’t think to ask what had happened to the man, or where he had been, or any of the other bits of information he’d been sent to find.

Something flared. A bright light, a whiff of ozone, and Charlie’s hand tingled. Static discharge—unusual in a moist environment like this one, but not unknown. Still, it surprised him enough that he let go, and when Devlin reached for him a second time Charlie just waved him away and stood on his own.

“Where have you been, sir?” he asked. “The Board—the entire company—has been well and truly freaked out.”

Charlie had been focusing on his feet as he stood—he didn’t feel like falling on his butt again—and now looked over to where Devlin had been standing. Only Devlin wasn’t there anymore. The man was sitting at the kitchen table, ten feet away.

How’d he get there so fast? Charlie thought.

The answer came instantly: He didn’t. I fell, I got rattled. Probably took longer to stand than I thought.

“Sir?” he asked again.

“We do so many things,” said Devlin at the table. He was far enough away that he was no more than a shadow in shadow, a wraith. “So many things because we can, but never thinking whether we should.”

Charlie didn’t know what was going on, but he realized he didn’t have to know. His assignment had been to find Devlin. The man had been found. Charlie would let others figure out the rest. He pulled out his cell phone. The screen was blank. He cursed.

“What is it?” asked Devlin.

“My phone’s out,” he said. “Musta used up the last of the juice on the GPS getting here.”

Devlin chuckled. Charlie looked up from his phone to see Devlin’s shadow, now standing in the living room.

I musta hit my head when I fell, he thought.

“Not much reception in a place like this,” said Devlin.

“It worked fine getting me here,” said Charlie. Devlin didn’t reply. The silence stretched out and became as thick as the darkness. Suddenly anxious, needing sound to break the peace, Charlie said, “Sorry about your door. I was sent in to find you. Like I say, lots of people are worried.”

“Door?” said Devlin. He sounded thin, empty.

Charlie’s neck prickled. The hairs stood up. Something about this wasn’t right. Nothing

A woman with piles of big red hair hollered, “Then fix it, Teddy!” before rounding on Charlie. “What’ll it be, stranger?”

“Coffee,” said Charlie. Then: “You got a phone?”

“Sure,” Dora said easily. “But the manager don’t let customers use it without paying in advance, five-dollar flat fee.”

“Fine,” said Charlie. “You take plastic?”

“Sure, hun.” He put his company credit card on the table. Dora took it. “Be right back,” she said.

“Can you bring the coffee too?”

“You betcha,” she said with a wink and a smile. She left. As she did, the juke box fizzled and went dark.

Dora was gone a long time. When she came back, she was no longer smiling. “Sorry, hun, the card didn’t go through.”

“What?” Charlie frowned. “That’s impossible.”

“Maybe,” said Dora neutrally.

Charlie waited. “Okay, then just give me the card back and—”

“Wish I could, hun,” said Dora smoothly. “Only, when I ran the card it came up with a weird error message. Never seen it before, not in twenty-five years here, so I called the sheriff and he said—”

Charlie didn’t hear the rest. He realized that a police cruiser was stopping outside the diner, belching out an oversized man who wore a gray cowboy hat on his head and a gold star on his jacket. The sheriff saw him at the same time. His hand went to his gun and Charlie heard him shout, “Stop!”

Charlie bolted to his feet. He didn’t intend to run—not at that point—but he did need to move. He felt caged, trapped. Like he was still back in that little house on the beach, even though he was here in this greasy-spoon diner in a too-small-for-a-map town.

“Everywhere,” he heard Devlin whisper in his mind. “Nowhere.”

The lights in the diner went out. The sun was well above the mountains, but there was no mistaking it. They went out with a snap, and then Charlie was running. Running from what, he did not know. He just knew that he had to run. That if he didn’t, if he was caught, it would all end.

***

He didn’t remember getting away from the sheriff. He didn’t remember running out of the town. But he must have done both, because the next thing he knew, Charlie was in a different town—

(“Everywhere. Nowhere.”)

—and he was standing in front of a public phone booth. He looked down at himself. His clothes were filthy, his shoes looked like he’d ground them against stone. But it was all right. He could call the company. He could call collect if he had to—he was pretty sure he remembered that was possible. He’d call, he’d report. They’d come get him. He’d be fine.

He stumbled into the booth. Swung the door shut behind him. He picked up the receiver.

He heard chitterings. The scrape of metal on metal, the rasp of long-dead connections revived.

Charlie started to scream. He screamed, and he did not stop.

***

He didn’t remember much after that. Just pieces. Bits. Fragments. He remembered trying to go into a store, but the automatic doors wouldn’t open. He pressed them, forcing them to open manually, but as soon as he got the doors open, people began streaming out around him and a security guard asked him to “Please exit because there’s some kind of power outage” and shoved Charlie right out with everyone else.

He remembered waiting at a bus stop. The bus drew up to him, but the engine died. The doors swung half open and jammed. Charlie waited as the passengers started to panic. He watched them clawing at each other, trying to get out of the thing that had been a reassuring tool only moments before, and now felt to them like a trap. He walked away when a well-dressed woman in her thirties started clawing at a man, raking his cheeks and face with her manicured nails. When he was fifty feet away, the bus started again. Charlie didn’t try to get back on.

He blanked out again—or perhaps he didn’t, and it was the world that blanked around him. Either way, the next thing he remembered was being taken out of a police station. A confused rookie was explaining that they couldn’t make the computers work, it was his lucky day and telling him, “Get yourself a job, because some places are even more serious about prosecuting vagrancy than we are.”

More flashes. More places. When the sun went down, Charlie slept, because the lights wouldn’t turn on around him anymore. Whether it was a car’s headlight as it drove toward him, or a streetlight high overhead—all lights darkled when Charlie passed by.

He found a drunk man on the street. The man was dressed in a nice suit. He looked familiar. Perhaps it was someone Charlie had known once. The man was calling someone on the phone, alternating between sobs and laughter. Charlie took the phone out of his hand, thinking to call someone—anyone. Only the phone went dark as he took it. Dead and useless, even though he could hear that chittering sound. It was clearer now. It seemed like a voice.

“Everywhere. Nowhere.”

Charlie wandered. He walked, he slept, he dreamed, he woke, he walked again. He ate from trash barrels. One time he was picked up by an officer who said he looked just like one “Charles Percy Xavier,” a missing person of some importance. But they couldn’t even get the cruiser to start, and the cop couldn’t call in his find. Charlie stumbled away while the man tried to figure out why, abruptly, nothing worked.

And then he was back. Back at the car now, overgrown with webs and weeds. Back through the miles of brush and the hilly trails that switched back and forth as the sea crashed below.

Back in the house.

Devlin was there, standing in the kitchen. Perhaps he’d left and come back. Perhaps he’d always been there. Perhaps Charlie had never left.

“What….” Charlie shook his head and swallowed, trying to force saliva into a mouth dry with lack of use. “What happened?”

“Nothing worked?” said Devlin.

Charlie nodded. “Nothing worked.”

He blinked, and now Devlin was sitting on the couch. The older man looked as he had—terrible, decrepit, but no more so than he had last time.

If it was a last time, Charlie thought. Or a first time, or any time at all.

Devlin shrugged. “We followed quantum computing,” he said. “I followed the threads. I followed them down until they were so small they were the entire universe, then I followed them back.”

Charlie shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

Once more, Devlin shrugged. “You don’t have to. It’s all just states, just percentages. We lived for a long time in a state where things worked and made sense.” He chuckled. “And now we’ve found a version that doesn’t.” Then he grew serious. “Did you get out?” he asked.

Charlie shrugged. “Dunno.”

Devlin was standing in front of him now, though Charlie hadn’t seen him move from the couch. “Think. Think. I never got past the treeline, not after the first time, and even then I didn’t get far at all. But I think you did. I think you got farther away than I could. Did you?”

Charlie thought. Slowly, uncertainly, he nodded. “I…I think so.”

“And?”

“And what?”

“And was it everywhere? Was it everything? Is the whole world like this now?” Devlin said, and gestured around the darkened room of the darkened house that sat in the night on the beach.

Charlie thought. He remembered flashes.

A waitress telling him his card didn’t work.

A bus that wouldn’t start.

Radios and phones that wouldn’t call.

He started to shake his head, then froze. More flashes came:

People running.

Screaming.

A man who stood in the middle of the road shrieking for someone to run him over but no one would because no one could because the cars weren’t working anymore.

A woman holding her darkened cell phone high into the sky and screaming that her phone was dead and so was she because nothing worked and this had to be Hell.

He remembered Dora. Huge piles of red hair, a smile. That had been the first time. But the last time he saw her she was staring at a juke box that wouldn’t play, holding an electric knife against her neck. The electric knife wouldn’t work, so she just began sawing it herself.

Charlie closed his eyes against the sight. Against the memory. He swallowed. “It’s everywhere,” he said.

“Everywhere,” Devlin whispered. “I followed the threads until they were too small, then found the secrets at the bottom. Only they followed me back.” Devlin flickered. He had been sitting on the couch, and he still sat there. But he was also standing in front of the refrigerator, kneeling beside Charlie, standing upside down on the ceiling, walking in the hall. They were all there, they were all real, they all spoke as one: “They came back with me. The things that spun the quantum threads, waiting for us to follow, to find them, to bring them back from the ends of infinity. They were lost,” said all the Devlins, all the possibilities speaking in a single tone that came from a source Charlie could not place. “They were lost, but I found them. They were nowhere, but now….”

“Now they’re everywhere,” said Charlie.

The lights were already out, but it somehow seemed darker. Charlie went outside. He looked back as he did and saw that he was still standing in the living room of the small house. He was standing there, he was falling down by the fridge, he was on the floor with one arm raised high to ward off terror. He was walking around the house to check for clues and he was breaking the windowpane with his Maglite.

“I’m everywhere,” he said.

Devlin was beside him. “You’re everywhere,” he agreed.

They looked up together. The stars were winking out, one by one.

“Everywhere,” said Charlie.

“And everything,” said Devlin. “For a long time.”

The stars were extinguishing, faster and faster.

“And now we’re nowhere,” said Charlie. Only one star was left. He could hear himself screaming—the him that stood on the beach, the him in the house, the him that he had left behind when he came looking for Devlin an eternity ago.

Devlin nodded. “And nothing,” he said, and the last star winked out.

Excerpt from Nicholl semi-finalist Crusader