Branching Out: The Art of Writing in Multiple Genres
I always wanted to write historical fiction. It’s what I gravitate to as a reader and where my brain takes me when crafting new stories. The biggest challenge with this genre is that it goes through waves. For years the Tudors were hot, then it was the World Wars. Now? No one is exactly sure.
(12 Dos and Don’ts of Research Travel for Writing.)
In these “in between” periods, selling historical novels can be tricky. Some houses are willing to take a gamble that your renaissance-era saga may be the Next Big Thing™, but other houses may refrain from buying anything historical from newbies or mid-listers until the market figures out what it’s going to do. In order to remain solvent and relevant, I decided it was time to branch into another genre: contemporary women’s fiction.
After almost a decade of the book-a-year pace, I now aim to produce a work of women’s fiction each year in addition to my historical works. The hope is that I can focus on one genre as the other regulates in times of uncertainty and generate income while I wait. And if there is one thing we can depend on in publishing, it’s times of uncertainty.
I decided to create a line of women’s fiction that, like my historical fiction, is deeply atmospheric and centered around strong female protagonists. Sweeping locales (Provence!), lots of sensory detail, and a sense of nostalgia and introspection in my women’s fiction bridges the gap with my historical fiction so that I’m not alienating my existing readership. The hope isn’t to start over, but to expand from where I am now.
Some people might assume that branching into women’s fiction from historical fiction would be easy. There is less research to do (though not none), and I don’t have to worry about pesky things like historical accuracy. And yes, it’s nice not having to worry about whether a specific town would be under siege, making a chapter or an entire act of my novel implausible. It’s nice not having to worry about being faithful to the historical figures and fretting about depicting them as honestly as I can.
But the flip side of that coin is that I don’t have historical events to provide a sort of scaffolding to the structure of my narrative. I don’t have real historical people from whom to draw inspiration. Most vitally, I don’t have the external stakes—like a war—to keep the pace and the tension from dragging.
There were many times when I was writing my debut women’s fiction, The Memory of Lavender and Sage, that I would have been grateful to throw in a well-timed explosion to help the narrative along. Hélas, that wasn’t all that plausible for a sleepy Provençal town in 2023. I had to delve deep into the realities of French village life to find external stakes, and once I started researching, there was plenty of grist to work with.
Check out Aimie K. Runyan’s The Memory of Lavender and Sage here:
(WD uses affiliate links)
Villages are dying because the youth are moving to the cities for better jobs. Little by little, they shrink until the only residents left are senior citizens clinging to the memories of their once-vibrant towns. Once the village school closes, it’s game over. Once I tapped into that, the external force was there to drive the narrative. It just took more digging than my previous works to find it.
The other main worries are over saturating my readers and burning myself out. A key to preventing both problems is constant communication between the author, agent, and editors about deadlines and production schedules. I am working with two imprints of HarperCollins, so they are thankfully willing to work together to make a schedule that is tenable for me and won’t cannibalize my own readership.
That said, schedules will overlap. Inevitably, you will have copyedits land when you’re busy finishing a draft on a tight deadline and frantically getting ready for the launch of another project. That is just a reality multi-genre authors have to prepare for. But if you communicate with your teams, you can at least avoid having deadlines that simply aren’t feasible.
I find that releasing two books within six months of each other from two major imprints (and all the expectations that go with that) is a lot. Add in two co-authored projects, and it’s been a crazy couple of years. The key is finding the balance that works for you and filling your plate only to the point where you’re comfortable.
Notice, I don’t say the plate has to be brimming; leave the space you need to claim some balance and peace. It’s hard work, but the versatility of writing in multiple genres is a great way to stay relevant in an ever-changing industry.
With a growing catalog of instructional writing videos available instantly, we have writing instruction on everything from improving your craft to getting published and finding an audience. New videos are added every month!