Tag: fiction

Cover Reveal: MAYBE IN ANOTHER LIFE by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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I know the protocol for offering cover reveals is to make you read through a bunch of text in anticipation and finally reveal the cover at the end.

Well, I’m a graphic designer and reader, and my first encounter with a book is usually with its cover. So I’m starting there, with my first impressions, just like I did with Taylor Jenkins Reid’s After I Do. Then we’ll talk about the story.

First Impressions

The Title

“Maybe in Another Life” is another great title from Reid. Seriously, this woman should teach a class on evocative titles. To me, it sounds like something any woman might say while daydreaming. “I’m unsatisfied with my current life. Maybe in this other, hypothetical life, I’d be more satisfied.”

But then we see the cover…

The Cover

MIAL_Reid_cover

So what does the cover tell us? It’s all in the subjects and the symmetry. This book is about a classy lady with a decision between two parallel choices, either one of which you, Reader, would probably love to escape to.

Take away the aqua and the modern font (which hearkens to style magazines), and this might be a memoir or a stuffy novel about a museum curator. With the typeface and color choice, we know it’s Women’s Fiction.

How efficient is that? I’d like to give the highest of fives to the designers that work on Reid’s novels. Every one of them seems to say “Women’s Fiction is legit Lit, y’all!” (and it’s true).

And just in case you didn’t get the gist of the contents from the image, there’s a tagline which, yet again, is evocative and ties everything together.

Are you excited for this book? Because I am. I’m ready to preorder right now …

PREORDER:

IndieBound | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-a-Million | Apple | Blio | Google

But if you really want to read the blurb before ordering, then …

The Blurb

From the publisher:

At the age of twenty-nine, Hannah Martin still has no idea what she wants to do with her life. She has lived in six different cities and held countless meaningless jobs since graduating college, but on the heels of a disastrous breakup, she has finally returned to her hometown of Los Angeles. To celebrate her first night back, her best friend, Gabby, takes Hannah out to a bar—where she meets up with her high school boyfriend, Ethan.

It’s just past midnight when Gabby asks Hannah if she’s ready to go. Ethan quickly offers to give her a ride later if she wants to stay.

Hannah hesitates.

What happens if she leaves with Gabby?

What happens if she leaves with Ethan?

In concurrent storylines, Hannah lives out the effects of each decision. Quickly, these parallel universes develop into surprisingly different stories with far-reaching consequences for Hannah and the people around her, raising questions like: Is anything meant to be? How much in our life is determined by chance? And perhaps most compellingly: Is there such a thing as a soul mate?

Hannah believes there is. And, in both worlds, she believes she’s found him.

Let’s break this down.

“Hannah Martin” Anybody else think Hanna Marin from Pretty Little Liars? Just me? Okay.

“high school boyfriend … Hannah hesitates” The fact that she hesitates tell me there’s still something there between Hannah and Ethan. I’m not a fan of on-again, off-again relationships, so I’m hoping that the “something there” is mostly attraction with some underlying drama that will give off plenty of heat, but no HEA for those two.

You should all know by now that I’m not super into romance, and that my favorite movies have “happy for now” endings rather than “happily ever after” ones. But I do have a not-so-secret affinity for Hilary Duff movies. So if these two end up together, I want it to be Sweet Home Alabama style, with a clear, good reason they broke up and an ending that’s a no-brainer that they need to be together. None of that “we couldn’t handle being apart from each other for more than a month, so we broke up” nonsense.

“In concurrent storylines”. Aww yiss. I love me some nonlinear storytelling.

“with far-reaching consequences” Double yesss. Fiction without consequences is just irresponsible. Curious George is horrible. But seriously, I am a fan of chain-reaction plots. Just because I don’t believe in love at first sight—attraction, OF COURSE. Have you seen my husband?—that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy stories about fate. The fact that this is a cause-effect sort of plot lets me know there won’t be random coincidences.

“soul mate” I’ll buy it. “The One”? No. I’ve known too many widows. But I like to think that my husband and I are linked more than just mentally, socially, and physically.

Reading

You’ll have to wait until I read it for me to give a review! But now you know what kind of expectations I have going into it.

Author Chat

You can follow Taylor Jenkins Reid on Twitter @tjenkinsreid. I’m sure she’ll be interviewed about Maybe in Another Life soon.

Recommendations

I haven’t read it yet! But Reid herself recommended books by Emily Giffin or Amy Hatvany after I enjoyed After I Do.

Writing Prompt

Write about a decisive moment in your life, and what happened as a consequence. Turn it into a story, a short blurb of a memory, or a flow chart. Or ask a friend or relative about a seemingly insignificant choice they made that ended up changing their or someone else’s life.

An example: A man switched from a music major to a history major, which meant he spent five years in college instead of four. His fifth year was the first year a “colloquium” class was offered—an independent study tied to a spring break trip to Ireland and the UK. It was my freshman year, and I also signed up for the trip. We were low on numbers, and needed a couple more students to sign up before the trip could be booked. He invited his brother, a Junior history major, whose topic of choice was the historicity of King Arthur. My topic was Arthurian literature. We became study buddies, then friends, then more than friends, and now we’re married. I introduced my now-brother-in-law to one of my college roommates, and they were married last November.

So there you have it. A “major” change that didn’t actually affect his career at all, but certainly affected his family. Now he has a wife, a sister-in-law, and two nephews because of it.

Friday Reads: AFTER I DO by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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I’m starting a new series on the blog! I haven’t blogged about books in forever, so the hope is one per week. I’ll only be blogging about my favorites (no room for negativity here), and I’ll end with a writing prompt. Ideally I’ll post ever Friday, but life happens! So be sure to subscribe if you haven’t already, and then you can be sure to not miss out. Adult fiction, YA fiction, MG, graphic novels, picture books—I’ll cycle through them all.

Starting off, After I Do by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I’d heard so much about this novel on Twitter, I had to pick it up, even if Women’s Fiction isn’t usually my bag.

First Impressions

The Title

“After I Do” is a great title. Immediately we know it’s about what happens after a wedding, rather than before, regarding a married couple.

The Cover

The color, the illustration that leans on the doodle side, the tagline—these tell me this is women’s fiction, possibly bordering on “chick lit.” The hip, handwritten typeface tells me this is a contemporary novel.

The illustration itself, with the knocked over champagne glass, tells me the celebration—the honeymoon—is over. This isn’t a romance after the wedding, this is about a broken marriage.

The Blurb

From the publisher:

From the author of Forever, Interrupted—hailed by Sarah Jio as “moving, gorgeous, and at times heart-wrenching”—comes a breathtaking new novel about modern marriage, the depth of family ties, and the year that one remarkable heroine spends exploring both.

When Lauren and Ryan’s marriage reaches the breaking point, they come up with an unconventional plan. They decide to take a year off in the hopes of finding a way to fall in love again. One year apart, and only one rule: they cannot contact each other. Aside from that, anything goes.

Lauren embarks on a journey of self-discovery, quickly finding that her friends and family have their own ideas about the meaning of marriage. These influences, as well as her own healing process and the challenges of living apart from Ryan, begin to change Lauren’s ideas about monogamy and marriage. She starts to question: When you can have romance without loyalty and commitment without marriage, when love and lust are no longer tied together, what do you value? What are you willing to fight for?

This is a love story about what happens when the love fades. It’s about staying in love, seizing love, forsaking love, and committing to love with everything you’ve got. And above all, After I Do is the story of a couple caught up in an old game—and searching for a new road to happily ever after.

Let’s break this down.

“They decide to take a year off … anything goes.” Already I think this is a stupid idea, that if two people want to fix their marriage, they should learn how to communicate, not take a break and do whatever falls under “anything goes.” But I’m intrigued. I’m just expecting some dumb choices from the characters.

“Lauren embarks on a journey of self-discovery …” This tells me that this book will be an emotional journey, with plenty of introspection, and probably not much action. It also tells me that this book is primarily about Lauren, not about Lauren and Ryan.

“This is a love story about what happens when the love fades.” This is what really sold me on reading the book. It’s a love story but not a romance. I’m not a fan of romances—the tropes, the miscommunications, the lies. But I love love stories.

Reading

This is a character-driven, theme-driven novel. It’s not plot- or action-driven. So if you start reading and don’t like Lauren, or if you aren’t interested in exploring marriage from all different points of view (in the book, the opinions come from the surrounding cast of characters), then this isn’t the book for you.

I like Lauren’s voice. The tone is depressing but funny, and I really enjoy that contrast. It’s like grief. Sad one moment, funny the next.

The way Reid can characterize through her characters’ dialogue makes me excited about any future movie deals. All of the characters are three-dimensional, even if they only make cameos. Even if I didn’t agree with their opinions or decisions, I felt like they were complex, real people, and not just that, but they were all sympathetic characters. Reading is an exercise in empathy, and I think I’m a more empathetic person after reading After I Do.

I really enjoyed this book. I even marked the letters in the book to have my husband read them (don’t tell his fellow Marines he enjoyed it). It sparked a great discussion. Reading it was almost like preventative couple’s therapy. I’d recommend this book to anyone who’s married or who plans on becoming married—it’s definitely a cautionary tale.

Author Chat

Taylor Jenkins Reid talks about After I Do in this interview from USA Today.

Recommendations

If you like After I Do, you might like books by Emily Giffin or Amy Hatvany.

If you’d like a personalized book recommendation from Penguin Random House, check out The Penguin Hotline.

Writing Prompt

One of the plot devices this novel employs involves letters written between characters. Choose two people at odds with each other, whether fictional or real, and have one write a letter to the other. Let the writer assume that the reader will never receive the letter, so he or she can be completely honest and uncensored.

15 New Books I Want to Read in 2015, Part One

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15 New Books in 2015 (January–June) | Write Lara Write

These are fifteen books coming out the first half of 2015 that I’d love to read! It’s a weird mix of adult literary and YA of all sorts of genres. Later I’ll post my top 15 of the second half of 2015, but I’m waiting on some cover reveals, first 🙂

Quotes either come from the Goodreads summary of the book or the recommendation from The Millions’ Most Anticipated: The Great 2015 Book Preview

Debut Authors

The Conspiracy of Us by Maggie Hall, 1/13/15

“Forbidden love and code-breaking, masked balls and explosions, destiny and dark secrets collide in this romantic thriller, in the vein of a YA Da Vinci Code.”

Unbecoming by Rebecca Scherm, 1/22/15

“A major debut novel of psychological suspense about a daring art heist, a cat-and-mouse waiting game, and a small-town girl’s mesmerizing transformation.”

The Country of Ice Cream Star by Sandra Newman, 2/10/15

“In the aftermath of a devastating plague, a fearless young heroine embarks on a dangerous and surprising journey to save her world in this brilliantly inventive dystopian thriller, told in bold and fierce language, from a remarkable literary talent.”

Mosquitoland by David Arnold, 3/3/15

“Told in an unforgettable, kaleidoscopic voice, “Mosquitoland” is a modern American odyssey, as hilarious as it is heartbreaking.”

Magonia by Maria Dahvana Headley, 4/28/15

“Maria Dahvana Headley is a firecracker: she’s whip smart with a heart, and she writes like a dream.” —Neil Gaiman

The Cost of All Things by Maggie Lehrman, 5/12/15

“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind meets We Were Liars in this thought-provoking and brilliantly written debut that is part love story, part mystery, part high-stakes drama.”

Nimona by Noelle Stevenson, 5/19/15

“Nimona is an impulsive young shape-shifter with a knack for villainy. Lord Ballister Blackheart is a villain with a vendetta. As sidekick and supervillain, Nimona and Lord Blackheart are about to wreak some serious havoc. Their mission: prove to the kingdom that Sir Ambrosius Goldenloin and his buddies at the Institution of Law Enforcement and Heroics aren’t the heroes everyone thinks they are.”

Fiction

The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro, 3/3/15

“The Buried Giant begins as a couple set off across a troubled land of mist and rain in the hope of finding a son they have not seen in years. Sometimes savage, often intensely moving, Kazuo Ishiguro’s first novel in nearly a decade is about lost memories, love, revenge, and war.”

God Help the Child by Toni Morrison, 4/21/15

“Spare and unsparing, God Help the Child is a searing tale about the way childhood trauma shapes and misshapes the life of the adult.”

The Trouble with Destiny by Lauren Morrill, TBD

“Pitch Perfect meets A Midsummer Night’s Dream on a cruise ship”

Nonfiction

The Fangirl’s Guide to the Galaxy: A Lexicon of Life Hacks for the Modern Lady Geek by Sam Maggs, 5/12/15

“The Fangirl’s Guide to the Galaxy is the ultimate handbook for ladies living the nerdy life, a fun and feminist take on the often male-dominated world of geekdom.”

Short Stories

Hall of Small Mammals: Stories by Thomas Pierce, 1/8/15

“[The stories] take place at the confluence of the commonplace and the cosmic, the intimate and the infinite.”

Lucky Alan: And Other Stories by Jonathan Lethem, 2/24/15

“From forgotten comic book characters stuck on a desert island to a father having his midlife crisis at SeaWorld, the nine stories in this collection explore everything from the quotidian to the absurd, all with Lethem’s signature humor, nuance, and pathos.”

Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances by Neil Gaiman, 2/3/15

“[It] should be no surprise that [Gaiman’s] third short story collection defies genre categorization, delving into fairy tales, horror, fantasy, poetry, and science fiction.”

Voices in the Night: Stories by Steven Millhauser, 4/15/15

“Voices in the Night collects 16 stories — ‘culled from religion and fables. . . Heightened by magic, the divine, and the uncanny, shot through with sly humor’ – that promise to once again unsettle us with their strangeness and stun us with their beauty.”

What new books are you looking forward to in 2015?

Guide to SFF (Science Fiction and Fantasy) Sub-genres

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Lara Willard answers genre questions: What's Magical Realism? What's the difference between Science-Fiction and Fantasy? What genre is my novel?

Find out the closest fitting sub-genre for your speculative fiction, or troubleshoot your genre in this guide for writers.

Contents

  1. Major Genres
  2. SFF Sub-genres Used in #SFFpit
  3. The Difference between Science Fiction and Fantasy
  4. What’s the Difference between…
  5. Setting-Based Sub-genres
  6. Literary Fantasy
  7. Fantasy Romance or Romance Fantasy (Order Matters!)

Major Genres

This post is about the sub-genres of science fiction and fantasy. If you don’t think your story falls into speculative fiction, see my post on commercial, literary, and “general fiction” categorization, or watch my seminar on understanding age categories and genres (>1 hr).

SFF Sub-genres Used in #SFFpit

If you are writing speculative fiction and plan on pitching via #SFFpit, or if you are researching #MSWL, you need to know your sub-genres. The total list, as of December 2014, is below. I’ve divided them based on the requirements of the sub-genre.

This list is what what used for #SFFpit in 2014. For current lists or other contests, please visit the contest host’s website or blog.

By Subject (Genre Depends on Specific Tropes)

  • #FA – fantasy
  • #DF – dark fantasy
  • #EF – epic or high fantasy
  • #MYF – mythic fantasy
  • #PN – paranormal
  • #SF – science fiction
  • #DS – dystopian
  • #ML – military science fiction
  • #PA – post-apocalyptic SF
  • #SP – steampunk

By Setting (Genre Depends on Time or Place)

  • #CF – contemporary fantasy
  • #HF – historical fantasy
  • #SO – space opera
  • #TT – time travel
  • #UF – urban fantasy
  • #WW – weird west

Crossovers

  • #FR – fantasy romance
  • #HF – historical fantasy
  • #AH – alternate history
  • #LF – literary fantasy
  • #MR – magical realism
  • #SFR – sci-fi romance
  • #SFT – sci-fi thriller
  • #SO – space opera
  • #TT – time travel

The Difference between Science Fiction and Fantasy

If the not-in-our-reality elements stem from technology, it’s Science Fiction. If they stem from magic or unknown forces, it’s Fantasy. There is crossover. The Force in Star Wars tied the series to fantasy until the Midi-chlorians debacle of the prequels, which tried to sever any ties with the fantasy genre by explaining the Force with science.

The umbrella term for Science Fiction and Fantasy is Speculative Fiction, which is fiction not limited by real-world settings or physics.

What’s the Difference between…

Contemporary Fantasy & Urban Fantasy?

Answer:  If the urban setting is so experiential that it becomes a living, breathing thing, then it’s Urban Fantasy. You could have a historical UF set in 1930s NYC or a futuristic UF. Contemporary Fantasy is contemporary. Internet age. The fraternal twin of urban fantasy is rural fantasy, but “rural fantasy” is better categorized by its setting in time, not place.

Contemporary = Internet age.

Historical = set in the past.

Contemporary Fantasy & Magical Realism?

In Magical Realism (#MR), the fantastic elements aren’t described as extraordinary. “It is what it is.” Examples of #MR would be One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and the film Big Fish. The setting is the “real world.” The difference between magical realism (#MR) and contemporary fantasy (#CF) is that CF treats the fantastic as being weird or extraordinary. It explains the magic or calls it magic (or something similar). Disney loves contemporary fantasy. It’s always calling stuff magic.

In a Magical Realism world, magic is real and ordinary. When something falls at a party, we don’t explain gravity to the whole room. It’s just a part of our reality. We accept it.

Genres with Gods and Goddesses—Paranormal, Mythic, Dark, or…?

These can have some overlap.

If the gods are based off classical or pre-established mythology, it’s a mythical fantasy. If they are interacting with the real world, it’s paranormal (specifically supernatural). If it’s set in an imaginary world (Narnia, Middle Earth, Westeros), then I’d just call it fantasy (#FA). If the tone is dark or evil, it would be dark fantasy.

High Fantasy & Space Opera?

They are quite similar. Epic/High fantasy entails a journey, often with a “fellowship.” Think Lord of the Rings, swords & sorcery. An epic fantasy is epic in characters, in setting, and in scope. Journeys span countries, take time. Space Opera is an epic tale, like epic or high fantasy, except the travel is between worlds, and the travel is usually done via space ship. Space Opera, if it contains spaceships, is Science Fiction. The setting is the main difference.

Post-Apocalyptic or Dystopian?

A dystopian novel is about a protagonist in a futuristic setting fighting a corrupt state.

If your “dystopian” lacks technology as part of the setting or corruption, it’s probably epic fantasy. It’s the difference between Big Brother (dystopian) and Dark Lord (epic fantasy).

A post-apocalyptic novel is about human survival. The story takes place after some major disaster has affected the world. Usually the disaster is a natural disaster (think Day After Tomorrow and other world-disaster movies), a zombie apocalypse (Warm Bodies, World War Z), World War III, an alien or monster invasion (The Book of Eli), or a disease outbreak (Contagion, Station Eleven). A post-apocalyptic novel may also be science-fiction thriller. Warm Bodies crosses over into paranormal romance. Station Eleven is often considered literary fiction.

Post-apocalyptic = after civilization—humanity vs natural disaster, invasion, or aftermath

Dystopian = against uncivilization—humans vs a corrupt State

PA and DS novels have an interesting cause-and-effect relationship. Take current day, add an apocalypse, have people survive, they end up creating a new government which becomes corrupt. That’s the beginning of The Hunger Games. Take a corrupt government, overthrow it in a major war, and you’ve got people trying to rebuild and survive. That’s Mockingjay.

Dark or Paranormal Fantasy?

To be grievously simplistic, paranormal means “monsters.” If your novel contains ghosts, vampires, were-animals, zombies, Big Foot, or any kind of “spooky” type of creature, it’s paranormal. Paranormal can be romance, adventure, or comedy. Generally it is placed under fantasy, but it could be post-apocalyptic (see Warm Bodies, above). If it’s a romance novel with a paranormal love interest, it’s paranormal romance.

A dark fantasy has a dark, ominous tone. It might concern death or criminal behavior. Usually a dark fantasy is considered a fantasy / horror crossover.

Not all paranormal fiction is dark. Twilight isn’t a horror novel, it’s a romance. Shaun of the Dead is more of a comedy adventure than a horror movie. I’d probably call it paranormal comedy. If it weren’t funny, but not particularly dark or ominous, just a paranormal adventure, I’d call it paranormal fantasy.

Setting-Based Sub-genres

If your novel prominently features historical settings or characters, it’s Historical Fantasy, Alternate History, or Time Travel.

  • Historical Fantasy (#HF) is set in the past but contains fantastic elements. It’s the fraternal twin of contemporary fantasy.
  • Alternate History #AH asks “What would happen if [historical event] had a different outcome?” While HF focuses on the past, AH focuses on a new present or future.
  • Time travel is either Science Fiction (if it uses tech or science to travel through time), or it’s a portal fantasy (if it uses a magic portal to travel through time).

If your novel primarily features the geography or heavens of a fantasy world (like Narnia, Middle Earth, Westeros, or Mount Olympus), it’s fantasy or one of its subgenres.

If your novel takes place in outer space or has interplanetary settings (it goes from one planet to the other), then it’s more likely science fiction.

The other setting-based genres, as sorted in the list above, should be pretty straightforward.

Literary Fantasy

Literary Fantasy #LF is a new addition to the #SFFpit hashtags. In LF, more emphasis is placed on theme, the human condition, or the prose. If book stores wouldn’t know whether to shelve you with SFF or with “Fiction” (aka General Fiction aka Literature), you may have written LF. Recent examples of Literary Fantasy—The Ocean at the End of the Lane (also Magical Realism), Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (Historical Fantasy), The Magicians.

Genre isn’t about labels, it’s about finding readers. SFF readers look for imagination and adventure that isn’t 100% ground in reality. Literary readers want excellent prose, or to be emotionally or mentally invested in a character or theme. Of course there’s crossover!

For more about the “literary” classification, read my post Literary? Mainstream? Commercial? What Genre Is This Anyway?

Fantasy Romance or Romance Fantasy (Order Matters!)

A Fantasy Romance is a Romance novel with fantastic elements. It takes more after the romance genre than the fantasy genre. That means the novel is primarily about getting two love interests into a relationship.

It’s like the difference between yellow-orange and orange-yellow. Put an “ish” after the first word, and you can tell that yellow(ish) orange is more orange, and orange(ish) yellow is more yellow. If your novel couldn’t stand its own among other romance novels, it’s more likely a romantic fantasy.

Whenever you combine two genres together, the second one is the prominent genre, and the first is the modifying adjective. Which genre readers would be more likely to enjoy your book? That’s your prominent genre.

If you still aren’t sure about genre, leave a question below or tweet your question to @LaraEdits.

Appendix: Am I a reputable resource on this subject?

Well, I think so. I’m a published literature essayist of Sigma Tau Delta, the International English Society. I graduated summa cum laude with an interdisciplinary degree in literature, writing, and English (among other things). Since then, I’ve traded in my academic writing for a conversational tone. As a writing coach, freelance editor, and writer, I have experience in the field and have been reading on the subject of speculative fiction genres for years. I’ve taken into account the opinions of literary agents, librarians, publishers, and readers. Collaborative opinions aren’t something you can cite easily, so don’t look for a works cited page or list of references here. If you’re writing a literature paper on the subject of sub-genres, you can cite me using the following information, based on your style guide: C. Lara Willard / “Guide to SFF (Science Fiction and Fantasy) Sub-genres” / Write Edit Repeat / [link to this post].

Update: Connor Goldsmith, literary agent at Fuse Literary, has shared his definitions on sub-genres, with a section devoted to horror, here.