Alex
Troubadour
So I was just wondering, is it best for a writer to stick to one, maybe 2 genres or does it not usually make a difference?
Most likely, it makes a differance for publishers, because books that mix genres a lot may be more difficult to market.
It absolutely doesn't matter to us writers in a practical sense, though.
I would say it most definitely isn't best for a writer to stick to one or two genres. Why? Because how ever will you grow as a writer?
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So yeah ... uh, why would you want to stick to one genre? What are the pros if any?
Another reason to stay in one genre is simply interest. That is, if as an author you have no interest in writing outside of one genre, you should not force yourself to do so merely for the sake of diversity. If you don't have a passion for what your are writing, it is doubtful a reader will, either.
Write in one genre or many, as your own preferences dictate. There is nothing wrong with either path.
I would say it most definitely isn't best for a writer to stick to one or two genres. Why? Because how ever will you grow as a writer? I strongly believe that one can benefit greatly from writing in as many genres as they can manage. Something about eggs and baskets...
Don't get me wrong, I read other genres much more than I read fantasy. And the first story I posted/wrote on this site was a non-fantasy challenge entry. And you make some great points. But there are other ways to grow as a writer, and you can easily risk over-extending yourself as a writer as well. To me, it's more important to figure out how to incorporate, for instance, the deep and normal characters you see in regular fiction into the fantasy worlds I want to write in. I even consider nonfiction, such as the decision making strategies JFK used during the missile crisis. Knowing elements of those genres helps me grow within the confines of what I want to achieve as a writer. But spending too much time with them can hinder my primary focus.
I think we may have to disagree on the over-extention part. Maybe it's just me (and my over analytical mind perhaps haha), but I can't think that way, isn't over extention just an excuse for not wanting to for fear of failing? In reality though - like with all things it seems - "it depends". such a cop out answer I know and I hate using it, but some times you need to focus on one thing, other times its worth trying The Other. "Your Mileage May Vary" and so on.
Over-Extension isn't a simple fear of failing. If you're published, you need to build an audience with your work. If you switch genres, your additional work will lose most of the audience that you've gained in the first genre. Attempting to maintain separate audiences, with separate interests, and often separate needs from you as a writer, is what we call over-extending yourself. Stretching yourself thin. I think someone or another had a line about butter. It's a real occurrence. I mean, certainly some people can do it, but I would imagine they look for places where an audience will overlap between the two genres, kind of like Sci-Fi and Fantasy.
So we shouldn't try?