Coyote Con

Panel: Meredith Holmes, Heather S. Ingemar, Anna Kashina, Angela Korra’ti, Lucy Snyder, Cindy Lynn Speer

6PM EST, May 9, 2010

[CindyLynn] 5:03 pm: OK, everyone,l shall we get started? Welcome to the Urban Fantasy/
Paranormal Fiction panel.

[CindyLynn] 5:04 pm: let’s start with intros. Angela? Would you start?

[annathepiper] 5:05 pm: Right on. Hi folks, I’m Angela Korra’ti, a.k.a. Anna the Piper, my usual online handle. I’m the author of Drollerie’s urban fantasy novel Faerie Blood, as well as having a short piece in the anthology Defiance. Also a ravenous reader of urban fantasy, and well, y’know, SF/F in general.

[CindyLynn] 5:06 pm: Meredith?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:06 pm: Hi! I’m Meredith Holmes, author of Unseelie and some short works for Drollerie Press and some things that are IP lol (but aren’t we all?). I love love love urban fantasy and paranormal fiction and skew towards romance in my fiction, both reading and writing.

[CindyLynn] 5:07 pm: Anna?

[Anna Kashina] 5:07 pm: Hi, everyone, I am Anna Kashina. I have been writing and publishing fantasy for over 10 years now. My newest novel “Ivan and Marya” is a dark romantic fantasy based on Russian myth, coming out from Drollerie Press at the end of the month.

My current work-in-progress is a paranormal fantasy set in modern day Pennsylvania with flashbacks into 16th century Russia. Currently I am reading “Spellbent” by our panelist Lucy Snyder and enjoying it very much!

[CindyLynn] 5:08 pm: Lucy? I don’t think you and I have met yet.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:08 pm: I’m Lucy A. Snyder, and I’m the author of a new urban fantasy series from Del Rey. My first novel, Spellbent, came out in late December, and the second novel, Shotgun Sorceress, will be out right before Halloween Aside from that, I’ve written a lot of short fiction in various fantasy flavors, and I love reading urban fantasy.

[CindyLynn] 5:09 pm: And Heather?

[Heather Ingemar] 5:09 pm: I’m Heather S. Ingemar, and I’ve been writing professionally for about four years or so. I began with short stories, and have found my comfort zone in the realm of novellas. I write for a couple indie presses — Drollerie Press and Echelon Press — and my favorite genre is some weird amalgamation of gothic, urban fantasy, young adult, and paranormal fiction. If you want to know more about me, please visit my website: http://ingemarwrites.wordpress.com/ I love hearing from people.

[CindyLynn] 5:10 pm: And I, your fearless Dragonlady…erm, Moderator. Most of my urban fantasy works are through Zumaya,…my first book, Blue Moon, as well as my upcoming novel, Unbalanced. I love the idea of magic versus our mundane world.

[CindyLynn] 5:11 pm: So to get the ball rolling, would you guys like to define Urban and paranormal fantasy?

[annathepiper] 5:11 pm: I’ll take a stab at it:

[Lucy Snyder] 5:12 pm: I tend toward a broader definition of urban fantasy – it’s a contemporary fantasy set in a city.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:12 pm: That’s a toughie if only because the definitions are so new, in a sense. The way I’ve experienced it, paranormal fantasy deals with, well, the paranormal in a fantastical sense. Werewolves, witches, etc. Not just sparkley vampires. And Urban fantasy is set in the modern world (well, define modern…) and is, well, a fantasy.

[Anna Kashina] 5:12 pm: An essential feature for urban/paranormal genres is that the story has to involve real-life characters and settings, something that could happen to any of us if we were placed in the right situation. Both genres involve supernatural elements — magic and/or magical creatures.

There is a range of opinions about the differences between urban and paranormal genres. An excellent definition given by Deena at the Mythic panel last weekend is that urban fantasy is rooted in fantasy and paranormal fiction is rooted in horror. Hence, urban fantasy involves fairies, wizards, ogres, and elves, while paranormal fiction is about ghosts, demons, and vampires. However, some stories involve both, so the two genres often intertwine.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:13 pm: I think anything from the mid-1800s to near future counts as “present day” for urban fantasy purposes

[annathepiper] 5:13 pm: Yeah. Urban fantasy slants less towards a romance emphasis in the plot, whereas paranormal romance will often play that up.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:13 pm: @Lucy:That’s a good range–I agree.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:14 pm: I agree — I feel it includes all modern-day settings. For example don’t see a “Rural Fantasy” genre popping up — just “Urban Fantasy”

[Lucy Snyder] 5:14 pm: It leaves the door open for cool UF/steampunk crossover, which I hope we’ll see more of

[MeredithHolmes] 5:14 pm: @Anna: I forgot about Deena’s definition, lol! That, for me, is a good and concise way of putting it.

[CindyLynn] 5:14 pm: I think, for me, the difference was defined well by Deena in last week’s Mythic chat…I think that Urban fantasy is, well, rooted in fantasy…the elelments of fantasy are really strong. Paranormal is the child of horror.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:14 pm: Muah hahaha!

[Lucy Snyder] 5:14 pm: I do think the city matters, though. I twitch a little when I see a book with a rural setting marketed as urban fantasy.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:14 pm:

[annathepiper] 5:14 pm: It’s tough to include stuff like oh, say, Patricia McKillip’s Solstice Wood as “urban fantasy”. It’s certainly a contemporary setting, but it’s _not_ urban, it’s specifically rural.

[CindyLynn] 5:14 pm: Sorry, great minds think a like. XD I need to read before I hit enter.

[annathepiper] 5:15 pm: *nodnods to Lucy* Yeah, exactly.

[Anna Kashina] 5:15 pm: I think the original meaning of ‘urban’ was ‘set in the city’, however the genre drifted away from that to ‘set in the real world’

[Lucy Snyder] 5:15 pm: Of course, I had an editor from a Very Big Publisher tell me flat out that Neil Gaiman isn’t an urban fantasy writer — I didn’t get the chance to ask her what the heck Neverwhere is if not UF

[Heather Ingemar] 5:15 pm: Good point, @Anna

[CindyLynn] 5:16 pm: I think that, in some ways, urban fantasy isn’t the best definition for…I don’t know…contemporary fantasy? Because that’s how I market Blue Moon because a lot of the book does take place in a cabin in the woods….

[CindyLynn] 5:16 pm: @ Lucy…that is weird. Neverwhere is certainly Urban.

[Anna Kashina] 5:16 pm: Lucy: I saw Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere listed in the annals of urban fantasy, among its very basic examples

[MeredithHolmes] 5:16 pm: I think there’s definitely a difference in contemporary and urban fantasy in terms of settings

[Heather Ingemar] 5:16 pm: yeah

[annathepiper] 5:16 pm: “Urban fantasy” I think tends to have a grittier aspect to it that more general fantasy doesn’t. You get a lot of mystery/detective style plots, murders that have to be solved and the like. More general fantasy, not so much.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:17 pm: Dresden Files is Urban Fantasy imho

[Heather Ingemar] 5:17 pm: (that ‘yeah’ was in response to the Gaiman question)

[Lucy Snyder] 5:17 pm: Yes. But I think to this particular editor, the nature of the fantasy and the city were both irrelevant compared to having a first-person kick-butt female protagonist fighting monsters

[MeredithHolmes] 5:17 pm: contemporary or general fantasy would be, imo, something like the Dragon books by Katie McAllister (though those are really more romance, aren’t they? Okay, let’s say Mary Janice Davidson’s mermaid series)

[CindyLynn] 5:18 pm: I always see Urban fantasy as having an underworld sort of appeal, empty warehouses and arcane rites being conducted in abandoned steel mills.

[Anna Kashina] 5:18 pm: Lucy: that’s interesting. Certainly something to keep in mind when dealing with individual editors.

[annathepiper] 5:18 pm: The Dresden Files are _definitely_ urban fantasy. Kat Richardson’s Greywalker books, another excellent example. Tanya Huff’s Vicki Nelsons, an early example of the genre and IMO one of the earliest. Emma Bull’s War for the Oaks. And, even though I kinda grit my teeth to admit it, Laurell K. Hamilton.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:19 pm: Which is a long way of saying, my personal definition of UF (which certainly encompasses Neverwhere and Sandman by Gaiman as well as Charles de Lint etc.) is not shared by all who buy books :-\

[MeredithHolmes] 5:19 pm: @Angela: I’m glad I’m not the only one gritting my teeth on that one lol

[Anna Kashina] 5:19 pm: To me, the two typical examples of urban and paranormal are Harry Potter (urban) and Twilight (paranormal).

[Heather Ingemar] 5:20 pm: Wouldn’t Hamilton fall into the Paranormal genre? Seeing as she’s got monsters and all?

[Lucy Snyder] 5:20 pm: Harry Potter also has the hidden world of magic, which is another hallmark of UF

[Heather Ingemar] 5:20 pm: Well… “monsters of the night”

[annathepiper] 5:20 pm: Hamilton leaned more towards urban fantasy in the earliest stretches of the Anita Blakes. And then leaned heavy towards paranormal later.

[CindyLynn] 5:20 pm: Huh! I never considered Harry Potter to be urban. I think that the varying definitions is why I go for roots. Where is the book rooted in? Horror? Are there vampires running around? Demons? Or is there a much more hard core fantasy element? g/a

[Heather Ingemar] 5:20 pm: ah hah

[Lucy Snyder] 5:20 pm: UF is very much a cross-genre thing

[MeredithHolmes] 5:21 pm: Hamilton also has the fantasy element in her Merry Gentry books, IIRC. Hmm…I tend to think of Harry Potter more as just fantasy but I can see that!

[CindyLynn] 5:21 pm: *makes loud ah sound when she considers hidden world of magic* OK, so what are the main hallmarks of UF? Hidden world of magic…nmon-human characters….

[Heather Ingemar] 5:21 pm: I love how genres can be mixed and matched now.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:21 pm: The cross-genre nature is what drew me to writing UF in the first place

[CindyLynn] 5:21 pm: Heather, yes, me too. I couldn’t write in one genre. Most of my books have a couple genres in them.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:22 pm: Urban fantasy, to me, means urban setting. Doesn’t necessarily have to be, say Chicago. It can be a bustling Sidhe city, for example.

[annathepiper] 5:22 pm: I’d be reluctant to say that “paranormal” is where you’d automatically put anything with monsters in it. Mostly because when I hear “paranormal”, it’s -always- followed by “romance”. Which is fine, but if you’re coming out of a more SF/F-oriented background, all your fantasy novels are going to have monsters and supernatural creatures in them, regardless of their setting and sub-genre.

[annathepiper] 5:23 pm: I mean, monsters and such are a staple of fantasy in general.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:23 pm: I was reading something the other day about how there’s a trend in romances towards the paranormal because (paraphrasing here) writing human heroes has gotten predictable

[Heather Ingemar] 5:23 pm: @Angela, that’s one reason I prefer calling my stuff “gothic”

[Heather Ingemar] 5:24 pm: My work doesn’t necessarily have romance in it (though to be fair, it often does), and it’s not quite chilling enough to fall into the Horror category.

[Anna Kashina] 5:24 pm: I feel that urban and paranormal are very much intertwined and it is hard to define them separately from each other. Clearly, a lot of it is also opinion-based. But I think importantly both genres have to involve some real life elements.

[annathepiper] 5:24 pm: Basically “paranormal fantasy” is redundant. “Paranormal romance” isn’t, since the usual tropes of the romance genre don’t include the fantastic elements. Ditto for “paranormal mystery”, which I also hear get tossed around some.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:24 pm: That’s an interesting point, @Meredith

[Lucy Snyder] 5:24 pm: There’s a spectrum, certainly, and no clear lines between the two

[MeredithHolmes] 5:25 pm: It’s a fuzzy border between the genres

[Heather Ingemar] 5:25 pm: I agree, Lucy

[MeredithHolmes] 5:25 pm: which just sounds wrong now that I read that aloud

[annathepiper] 5:25 pm: *nods to everybody* Yeah, overall there’s a big ol’ blurry line.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:25 pm: Very fuzzy

[CindyLynn] 5:25 pm: @Angela, that’s an excellent and interesting point. But…I’ve written both Urban and paranormal, there’s a definite difference in feeling.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:26 pm: I think that in paranormal fiction, however, you’re more likely to see more focus on relationships and less focus on the nature of monsters.

[Anna Kashina] 5:26 pm: Personally, I think it is very interesting that even between the five of us we have come up with so many definitions. Shows how multidimensional these genres can be.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:27 pm: Indeed!

[MeredithHolmes] 5:27 pm: Five authors, seventeen definitions lol

[CindyLynn] 5:27 pm: One book was focused on a magic artifact, for lack of a better way to put it (because I’m not here to advertise. ) And the other is focused on a murder that could have been perpetrated by werewolves. Magic comes into it, but I focus a bit more on making it a little creepy. The first book is more…I don’t know…action adventure that’s chilly?

[CindyLynn] 5:27 pm: *laugh* And we’re all 100%. That’s the beauty of fiction.

[Anna Kashina] 5:27 pm: So, should we talk about what makes these genres so attractive? To authors and to readers?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:28 pm: I think so!

[annathepiper] 5:28 pm: Good next topic. Go for it.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:28 pm: I didn’t have a notion that I was writing specifically an urban fantasy when I started writing Spellbent — I just saw it as a contemporary fantasy and I put in whatever struck my fancy. It was my agent who decided to present it as UF, and in the rewrite my editor had me alter the novel to conform more to genre expectations (rewriting the book in 1st person, strengthening the love story, reducing the horror content, etc.)

[CindyLynn] 5:28 pm: Meredith and I are on the same page. I almost typed the same thing, exactly. XD

[MeredithHolmes] 5:29 pm: We’re always attracted to faerie tales, as readers. To mythologies and fantastical stories. No one really likes reading about someone just like them, who had the day just like there,s where nothing really happens outside the realm of the normal. Even in Regency romance, for example, the heroine and hero are not “just like us”.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:29 pm: Writing in the genres is attractive, to me anyway, because I like bringing the not-normal into the normal. For very loose definitions of normal.

[annathepiper] 5:30 pm: With my reader hat on: I love me some urban fantasy/paranormal fiction (of whatever sub-genre, romance, mystery, etc.) partly because I just love the fantastic elements in general. But also because in these genres I’m a lot more likely to run into protagonists who are, well, _more like me_. I.e., women, and in some cases, even queer women. Female protagonists have become more available in classic/epic fantasy, sure, but they really dominate in UF/paranormal.

[CindyLynn] 5:30 pm: I think, for me, my favorite thing is what I mentioned earlier. I take the world I walk around in, that I see every day, and I look for the magical possibility in it. One time I was walking through my college campus (its very old…well, not by world terms, but by Pennsylvania terms) and I was like, “Ooh, there could be a ghost in that fountain, or hanging from that clock tower…” But not just that. I think that the world is a magical place…so it’s interesting to try and push those boundaries.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:30 pm: I also like it as a reader and writer because it’s got more strong female characters than other types of fantasy have traditionally had.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:30 pm: @ Lucy: Yes! Definitely!

[Heather Ingemar] 5:31 pm: Cindy’s said everything I was thinking.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:31 pm: Hm,. Reading what I wrote I think I need to re-define what I meant… I do find that the genres are more friendly to women, to pagans, to people who are not usually represented in mainstream fiction. But at the same time there’s the element of “wow, she can do magic! I can’t do magic!”

[Anna Kashina] 5:31 pm: Opting for a bit of philosophy:

I write fantasy because I feel that involving magic, expanding the human abilities to super-human, allows the author (and the reader) to explore the depths of the human soul far beyond what is possible within the real-life limitations. This can stand out even more if the main character is a realistic person from our everyday world.

[CindyLynn] 5:32 pm: And as a reader, I like these stories because I love to just escape into these interesting worlds…for me, fantasy that takes place in our world has such a different feel from, say, high fantasy. It’s really…it feels so much more possible. I find it really enchanting. And Heather, thank you. g/a

[Heather Ingemar] 5:32 pm: The world is a vast place, and even in the rural areas, the small towns, there’s infinite possibility for magic, surrealism, spookiness…

[MeredithHolmes] 5:32 pm: yep

[annathepiper] 5:32 pm: With my writer hat on: UF/paranormal’s not the only thing I want to write, and I do actually have other genres going on. But I like writing in the UF area just because, like many of my fellow panelists, I like adding the fantastic to the apparently “normal” world. And I get to throw in a lot of things I’m just enthusiastic about in general. Like bouzouki players from Newfoundland!

[Lucy Snyder] 5:32 pm: Contrasting fantasy with literary fiction — I enjoy reading and writing stories in which Things Happen

[Heather Ingemar] 5:32 pm: You’re welcome Cindy.

[CindyLynn] 5:32 pm: @Meredith, that’s very interesting. I love the idea of it reaching people who are usually cut out.

[Anna Kashina] 5:33 pm: Lucy — yes, I feel the same way.

[CindyLynn] 5:34 pm: When you guys sit down to write in this genre, do you have any special processes?

[Lucy Snyder] 5:34 pm: I start with the characters first.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:35 pm: To me, story emerges from plot, and plot emerges from character conflict and interaction.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:35 pm: Personally…not really. Vague yet unclear, right, lol? I have an idea about the supernatural elements in the story, I’ve researched them and made sure I know what I’m talking about, but I tend to treat them as any other character and they do what they do, interact with the humans or other non humans as the case may be. I figure out how I want them to end up then work backwards

[Heather Ingemar] 5:35 pm: I like starting with a normal, everyday, average situation… and then looking for the unusual in it. Like in my Dream-Drinker tales, Isabelle and Madeline were just two little girls who dreamed a lot… until the Dream-Drinker came in to steal them!

[annathepiper] 5:36 pm: I think the main thing I’ll need to look out for in writing UF (as opposed to my SF and epic fantasy I have in progress) is to make sure that anything “real” I’m sticking in is actually _right_. Because if you’re bringing in the real world, even if you’re going to paint magic all over it, you’re still starting with details that you risk screwing up.

[annathepiper] 5:37 pm: So, say, if I’m going to set a UF story in a city I don’t actually live in, I’m definitely going to want to find people who do live there and who I can talk to about what the city’s like. g/a

[CindyLynn] 5:37 pm: I start from either…I’ll see a scene, or I’ll have a character that needs to be written. But the other day, I was looking through realtor’s listings, and I saw this house for $5,000.00. So beat up…but I thought, “Wow, there’s a story. Why would a woman buy that house to live in it? Is she desperate? Is she trying to get away?” And I’ve been writing a story from that.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:37 pm: I agree, Anna; research is important. I’m working on a piece right now where the main character is a cross-country runner, and I know nothing about the sport, so I’m having to do research.

[Anna Kashina] 5:38 pm: I usually start with a plot focus — a big event, around which the story would revolve. I then build up the setting and choose the characters that would shine the most in this situation.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:38 pm: For me, usually it’s characters that bug me to write them. With Unseelie, I saw a card in a metaphysical shop with a picture of a faerie prince on it and thought “I wonder what he’d be like if he existed?” and it spawned from there

[Anna Kashina] 5:38 pm: And yes, for everything real research becomes very important. I find traditional fantasy in a created world much easier, because I can just sit down and make up things as opposed to finding out how they should really be. g/a

[Heather Ingemar] 5:39 pm: @Meredith: the characters usually come to me first, too

[MeredithHolmes] 5:39 pm: Glad I’m not the only one!

[Heather Ingemar] 5:39 pm:

[Anna Kashina] 5:40 pm: Lucy: how did you come up with your characters in Spellbent?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:40 pm: do y’all differentiate between the supernatural and the paranormal?

[Heather Ingemar] 5:41 pm: I don’t, particularly; supernatural is stuff that’s “beyond normal,” and the definition for paranormal’s roughly the same

[CindyLynn] 5:41 pm: I have to confess, I don’t, either. I see ghosts with the word supernatural more than paranormal, and that’s about as close as I come to it.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:42 pm: Someone had asked me that the other day and I was like “Um…there’s a difference?” so I was wondering what other writers thought.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:42 pm: Anna Kashina: I started with Jessie first; the story came about because of a short story assignment that never happened. I’d gotten word that a slot might open in the invitation-only anthology Apprentice Fantastic, and so I worked up a pitch involving a young woman who loses her master in a spell gone wrong in the middle of a city, and who must face a demon on her own without his assistance. The antho filled and I didn’t get to pitch, but the idea caught my fancy and I started writing the book

[Lucy Snyder] 5:43 pm: Supernatural implies a slightly darker or horrific element — poltergeists, demons, etc. Paranormal doesn’t carry that implication.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:43 pm: hmm. I hadn’t thought of it like that.

[CindyLynn] 5:44 pm: @Lucy, that’s pretty cool. I like that.

[Anna Kashina] 5:44 pm: Lucy: that’s very interesting. As a reader, I am glad the anthology didn’t get your story

[annathepiper] 5:44 pm: @Meredith: Geez, that’s a hard call. I don’t think I differentiate between “supernatural” and “paranormal” so much as what fantastic elements/creatures I include in a story, and what ones I don’t. Faerie Blood’s universe is on record as having Sidhe and Sidhe-descended magic, Celtic-mythos creatures, and Japanese/Asian-mythos creatures, but there are a lot of things it specifically won’t include….

[annathepiper] 5:45 pm: … and the other UF I have, which I haven’t queried around yet, has only “Greek gods” as its fantastic elements. And any other creatures in Greek mythos.

[Anna Kashina] 5:45 pm: I never thought about differentiating between paranormal and supernatural. In a way these two words should have almost exactly the same meaning. Perhaps paranormal is a tad closer to normal than supernatural…

[MeredithHolmes] 5:46 pm: “beside normal”

[Lucy Snyder] 5:46 pm: re: greek gods: Medusa’s a pretty scary character IMO

[annathepiper] 5:46 pm: “Paranormal”, even aside from book genres, always makes me think of the X-Files.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:46 pm: saying that makes me think of Three Amigos. “He’s not just famous… he’s INfamous!”

[annathepiper] 5:46 pm: @Lucy: She IS!

[Heather Ingemar] 5:46 pm: @Angela ROTFL [Ed. Note: Rolling on the Floor Laughing]

[Anna Kashina] 5:47 pm: Angela: I think X-files are indeed paranormal fiction, right?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:48 pm: I think they definitely fall into that rubric.

[annathepiper] 5:48 pm: @akashina: Definitely. If they’d been a book series I’d be hard pressed to decide whether to shelve them as UF or maybe paranormal mystery.

[CindyLynn] 5:48 pm: We spoke about reasearch…do you guys have any favortie books or sites? I use Kunz’s the The Curious Lore of Precious Stones and Maud Greive’s Modern Herbal to base my magic on…

[annathepiper] 5:49 pm: theoi.com is AWESOME for Greek mythos stuff.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:50 pm: The Element Encyclopedia series is great.

[CindyLynn] 5:50 pm: Also, any final comments before we open the floor for questions?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:50 pm: and, oddly, anthropology books. and pantheon.org

[Anna Kashina] 5:50 pm: I use history books on the time period I chose. If I know nothing at all on the subject, I start with Wikipedia and go in depth from there.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:50 pm: I vote for Pantheon.org

[Heather Ingemar] 5:50 pm: Great, great resource

[Heather Ingemar] 5:51 pm: Where else could you find out that vampires were also, once upon a time, allergic to dirty socks?

[annathepiper] 5:51 pm: LOL

[CindyLynn] 5:51 pm: Heather, that’s SO cool!

[MeredithHolmes] 5:51 pm: …they would never ever bother my husband.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:51 pm: Isn’t it a riot?

[CindyLynn] 5:52 pm: That is! I have a feeling I know where I’m going to procrastinate…erm, I mean, research…tomorrow.

[Lucy Snyder] 5:52 pm: Based on that, and the garlic aversion, pizza delivery boys should largely be safe from vampiric attack

[Heather Ingemar] 5:52 pm: Indeed, Lucy!

[CindyLynn] 5:52 pm: @Lucy…yes. XD

[Anna Kashina] 5:53 pm: I heard garlic aversion is not compulsory

[Jazzyartwriter2] 5:54 pm: I have a WIP started during NaNoWriMo that involves monsters, an urban setting, murder mystery, romance, the paranormal, a protagonist with magical ability, romance, and is roughly based on the fairy tale Cinderella. Am I right in calling this an urban fantasy? Also, I love that part about the dirty socks. LOL.

[MeredithHolmes] 5:55 pm: I think you could call it UF!

[Lucy Snyder] 5:55 pm: I’d say so — does it focus more on action/adventure/mystery, or on romance?

[Lucy Snyder] 5:55 pm: If the romance is front and center, paranormal romance

[CindyLynn] 5:55 pm: I think that you can certainly call it that. My rule is that the author can define their own work however they want…always and right up until their editor disagrees with them. XD

[Lucy Snyder] 5:55 pm: Otherwise, UF FTW!

[MeredithHolmes] 5:55 pm: @Cindy: lol

[CindyLynn] 5:55 pm: But teasing aside, you’d fit my definition.

[Jazzyartwriter2] 5:55 pm: It focuses probably 60% on action in the beginning and near the end will have more romance.

[Anna Kashina] 5:55 pm: Jazzyartwriter2: I think with this range you can have the luxury to market it wider, to different markets. But in the end, one element must still prevail, and once that is defined, you should target it this way.

[riversway] 5:56 pm: I noticed a lot of the definitions included the ‘other’ that was quite obvious… fairies… werewolves etc… what if the ‘other’ is just the tiniest bit out of sync? For eg what about a story of a woman whose past lives begin to impinge on her current reality?

[MeredithHolmes] 5:56 pm: That’s really interesting! I think that’d, to me, be paranormal.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:57 pm: I think that would fall into the category.

[Anna Kashina] 5:57 pm: Yes, I would agree with Meredith.

[CindyLynn] 5:57 pm: I agree with Meredith completely, unless those past lives involve, for example, fae, or other things that are very much more fantasy.

[annathepiper] 5:57 pm: @Riversway: UF doesn’t need to have big flashy obvious fantastic elements IMO. Also: _wow_, that actually sounds like fun.

[annathepiper] 5:58 pm: Though yeah, I’m with the others; if it’s otherwise “the real world” and the main unusual thing is “this woman has past lives”, yeah, that sounds like “paranormal” to me.

[decode1863] 5:58 pm: I am having a hard time deciding what my short stories are, exactly. They take place in a city setting, but they involve a Castle/Bones like backdrop, and there’s vampires. Any ideas about where I could THINK about submitting that? (Like what genre I should be looking for?)

[Heather Ingemar] 5:58 pm: In terms of short stories, it’s always a little bit of a crapshoot. (sorry about the language)

[Anna Kashina] 5:58 pm: If there are vampires, it should be paranormal, IMO.

[CindyLynn] 5:58 pm: I would say Paranormal…also, some editors use the term dark fantasy that could also work.

[CindyLynn] 5:59 pm: (I used to market my stuff as dark fantasy…it’s a term that I think has fallen out of use.

[Heather Ingemar] 5:59 pm: In your case, I’d look for markets that closely mimic the type of fiction you write, and submit there. (This will involve reading.)

[decode1863] 5:59 pm: I don’t mind reading! I do a lot of that!

[Heather Ingemar] 5:59 pm: Try Duotrope.com to help you narrow your search.

[Anna Kashina] 5:59 pm: I think with such elements you, again, can submit to a range of markets. In my experience it is more about what the editors like, not the exact definitions of the genre.

[CindyLynn] 6:00 pm: @Heather, excellent point. Going to Border’s for example, and flipping through their magazines will help a lot, and searching www.ralan.com….

[Heather Ingemar] 6:00 pm: @Cindy I like that term too, but I don’t know why it’s fallen by the wayside.

[Lucy Snyder] 6:00 pm: I agree with Heather — look for magazines/sites that publish fiction that seems to be swimming in the same pool as yours

[widdershins] 6:00 pm: Who in their right mind WOULDN”T be allergic to dirty socks! … the question is why were vampires alergic?

[MeredithHolmes] 6:00 pm: sensitive noses

[decode1863] 6:00 pm: Thank you for your advice!

[Heather Ingemar] 6:01 pm: ROTFL! I don’t know, and the article never said. It just listed them as an allergen, like garlic

[CindyLynn] 6:01 pm: I’m oddly fascinated by this…

[basletum] 6:02 pm: What would a story with the Dover Demon be classified in? Urban Fantasy or Paranormal? g/a

[MeredithHolmes] 6:02 pm: basletum: I’d think, depending on the setting and the story itself, it could go either way

[annathepiper] 6:03 pm: Demons are _real_ big in paranormal romance/mystery, but they’re also real big in UF in general. So as with previous answers, yeah. Much depends on the overall composition of the story.

[Anna Kashina] 6:03 pm: I noticed that most submission guidelines usually say urban/paranormal, so when in doubt you can just avoid the definition in your cover letter.

[CindyLynn] 6:03 pm: I agree…usually people throw demons right into paranormal, because of the horror element, so it also depends on if the other elements over ride it.

[annathepiper] 6:03 pm: A pro in a panel I went to once compared it to baby food. “Peas with carrots” is NOT the same thing as “carrots with peas”!

[MeredithHolmes] 6:03 pm: lol! That is an excellent metaphor

[Rachael de Vienne] 6:04 pm: urban fantasy is a catch all phrase … as shown by the many definitions. it covers fantasy set in the otherwise real world … even with a rural setting. …. and akashina is right, it’s more about what editors like than exact definition. … Vampire in Europe … montague summers, 1928 … socks and such

[Anna Kashina] 6:04 pm: lol!

[Anna Kashina] 6:04 pm: Sorry, my lol was for angela, about peas and carrots. g/a

[decode1863] 6:06 pm: One more! Shapeshifters that are NOT were creatures. Paranormal? Supernatural? I don’t consider ALL shapeshfters to be horror genre….

[Lucy Snyder] 6:07 pm: It depends on how they’re treated

[MeredithHolmes] 6:07 pm: beat me to it lol

[Anna Kashina] 6:07 pm: decode1863: I guess it depends if your shapeshifter is scary or not. But overall I feel it is one of those shady areas and the exact genre would be defined by where your story goes.

[Heather Ingemar] 6:07 pm: I think like with most characters, it depends on the intent — is the character going to be a villain or a good guy?

[Jazzyartwriter2] 6:07 pm: I agree. I’ve read romances where shapeshifters turned into hunks. I love those kind of books.

[CindyLynn] 6:08 pm: No, but again, I think it’s a question of roots…where does the shapeshifter come from? What kind of story? And also of tone.

[annathepiper] 6:08 pm: I’d be hard pressed to point at any given monster and say “that’s supernatural” or “that’s paranormal”, yeah. The important question is ‘what kind of story are you telling about them?’ rather than ‘oh if you have this creature, it’s this kind of story’

[Heather Ingemar] 6:08 pm: Villain shape shifter — easily horror. Good guy — not so much.

[Lucy Snyder] 6:08 pm: A werewolf story that focuses on the fear and violence of the change, the violence of being in beast-form, that would be horror.

[Lucy Snyder] 6:08 pm: A werewolf story that focuses on the pack and a romance with a chick in a strappy black dress — paranormal

[decode1863] 6:08 pm: Well, these guys are shapeshifters that are born because a demon and a human mated.

[vigorio] 6:09 pm: If the story is set on an Earth-like fictional planet that is steam punked and there are demons, faeiries, elves, etc as well as monsters how would that classify?

[Lucy Snyder] 6:09 pm: fantasy

[Heather Ingemar] 6:09 pm: fantasy

[annathepiper] 6:09 pm: Fantasy. Yeah.

[MeredithHolmes] 6:09 pm: Fantasy. you could, IMHO, even go with urban fantasy if it’s an urban setting for the story

[annathepiper] 6:09 pm: I wouldn’t call it urban fantasy if it’s not Earth.

[vigorio] 6:10 pm: It has cities and rural. it’s epic fantasy.

[Anna Kashina] 6:10 pm: I agree: if this is not real Earth but Earth-like, it is fantasy.

[Heather Ingemar] 6:10 pm: I think the “urban, contemporary, etc” classifications are reserved for real life settings in fantasy.

[MeredithHolmes] 6:10 pm: hmmm, fair enough.

[CindyLynn] 6:10 pm: Very much so…and depending on how much flavor there is towards city life, you could probably go urban? But depending on how much horror there is…how much spooky stuff, since you have steampunk you might want to call it gothic, to capture that flavor. g/a

[Lucy Snyder] 6:10 pm: One thing that was emphasized to me — you don’t go *too* exotic with urban fantasy, and especially not paranormal romance. The more outlandish and less real-world it is, the less likely you are to sell it as an urban fantasy rather than a regular fantasy

[annathepiper] 6:10 pm: I’ve seen several fantasy novels where the setting is actually predominantly in a city, and which in fact use a lot of urban fantasy tropes such as “there’s a detective-like protagonist who has to solve a crime”–but since it’s _not Earth_, it’s still marketed as fantasy.

[MeredithHolmes] 6:10 pm: hmmm. okay then!

[Marva] 6:12 pm: Batman? Urban, real, fantasy, but just a bit off of all that.

[annathepiper] 6:12 pm: HA. If you’re talking superheros, that’s really off in another genre entirely.

[CindyLynn] 6:12 pm: Huh, good point.

[elizabeths] 6:13 pm: Thanks for the link to pantheon.org. That’ll be helpful as I’ve just started researching a book that needs some mythological creatures.

[Anna Kashina] 6:13 pm: I always thought batman is set in an alternative reality.

[annathepiper] 6:13 pm: However, I’d mostly just qualify Batman as “awesome”! ^_^

[CindyLynn] 6:13 pm: For me, any comic book (or graphic novel, if you’d rather) with superheroes must be?

[Heather Ingemar] 6:13 pm: *high fives Angela*

[CindyLynn] 6:13 pm: OK, everyone! Any other thoughts?

[MeredithHolmes] 6:14 pm: This has been a lot of fun, really educational for me lol.

[PeachesNCream] 6:14 pm: Thank you panel for all the awesome info!

[CindyLynn] 6:14 pm: Mothers, remember the offer for a free copy of Chocolatier’s Wife. I won’t tell you that it’s worth the time for emailing deena, because I am obviously biased. *innocent look*

[annathepiper] 6:14 pm: Thanks all for coming and listening to us yammer, and special side thanks to Lucy Snyder for joining us. (I just put your book on my To Read list!)

[Lucy Snyder] 6:14 pm: Thanks for coming, everyone!

[zan] 6:14 pm: I agree thanks a bunch

[Heather Ingemar] 6:15 pm: Yes, thanks for attending!

[CindyLynn] 6:15 pm: Thank you all for coming. This was fun. And thank you to my fellow panelists. You awe me.

[Rae ] 6:15 pm: Awesome panel and great topic! Thank you for your insight panelists. I’m bummed I missed half but I’ll be eyeing the transcripts

[riversway] 6:15 pm: thank you everyone, Great session!:clap:

[barblucas] 6:15 pm: Thanks!

[Anna Kashina] 6:15 pm: Thanks, everyone!

[annathepiper] 6:15 pm: I WILL however tell the rest of you that indeed, Cindy’s book rocks and you should totally grab a free copy of it while you can.

[MeredithHolmes] 6:15 pm: Thanks, y’all!

[Greg] 6:15 pm: Thank you.

[CindyLynn] 6:15 pm: The transcript will be up tomorrow, I promise.

[CindyLynn] 6:15 pm: *hugs annathepiper*

[MeredithHolmes] 6:15 pm: whoooo!

[riversway] 6:15 pm: Thanks for the book Cindy!

[Rae ] 6:15 pm: Great! Thanks Cindy

[Dragonlots] 6:15 pm: Good panel. Thank you.

[Amber Stults] 6:15 pm: Thank you to our panelists and everyone who asked questions and had comments.

[CindyLynn] 6:15 pm: My pleasure!

[Anna Kashina] 6:15 pm: And, thanks Cindy for the mothers’ day gift! I am celebrating my very first mother’s day today!
[PeachesNCream] 6:16 pm: Thanks for the book Cindy!!

[MeredithHolmes] 6:16 pm: Yay! me too, Anna!

[CindyLynn] 6:16 pm: Aww, that’s awesome Anna!

[CindyLynn] 6:16 pm: And Meredith!

[Lucy Snyder] 6:16 pm: Congrats!

[Sowelu] 6:16 pm: Thank you everyone!

[MeredithHolmes] 6:16 pm: it’s something in the water

[PeachesNCream] 6:16 pm: Congrats Meredith and Anna!

[sjcollins] 6:16 pm: Thanks Anna, Angela, Heather, Lucy and Meredith

[annathepiper] 6:16 pm: *hugs all around* Y’all come say hi to me at angelakorrati.com at any time. Grab a chair, raise a jar, as we say in Great Big Sea fandom!