Can’t wait to have you with The Pink Fuzzy Slipper Writers Tuesday!

I’m sure Edie will be there.

Hi Linnea. Sorry I’m a bit late in chiming in. Was gone most of yesterday and evening. Thanx for joining us here at MM and terrific subject matter. I write sfromance as well and can relate with the whole blending efforts.

You had some great words of wisdom and I’ll have to print out this blog to keep many of them fresh in my mind.

Incidently, I still wear all that silver jewelry you helped talk me into last RT conference. Love that stuff.

Thank you for checking in and reading the blog, Cyn and Karin. ::Linnea holds out tray of chocolate peanut butter cups AND chocolate martinis…with one virgin martini for Mfitz…::

Jacqueline, I think you’re spot-on again with this:
**It’s the difference between college dorm mates, and a married couple. **

I know I said it’s fodder for another blog, but one of the big issues with doing cross-genre is avoiding info dumps…

“Well here we are, Captain Grxffiltre, at the third planet from the wormhole which you know was colonized by the T’reip’ors three hundred years ago after the Borotootoos attacked the space station at the Drifts and life as we knew it here in the Weekywoo Empire was changed…”

Jacqueline has some awesome blogs on info dumps (how not to) on our Alien Romance blog:

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/09/sexy-information-feed.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2008/08/source-of-expository-lump.html

But her marriage and roommate analogy say a lot. See, info dumps are like roommates. There’s a lot of redundancy (backstory), a lot of explanations about what roommate 1 likes or doesn’t and what roommate 2 will tolerate or not (info dumps) and in general it takes a long time for cohesion.

A marriage is different. There are short cuts, hand signals, shared preferences, one tube of toothpaste (no redundancies)…there’s an understanding we’re in this together with the same goals (I’m talking a good marriage here…). A cross-genre novel needs to work like a good marriage.

Cocoa powder in chili, MFitz? Now, that’s unique! Wait until I tell the huz!

**It seems to me you can be well read, and know the tropes, but just not burn for a genre**

Then you shouldn’t write in it. Writing a good novel is only slightly less difficult than having your eyeballs pulled out through your ears. You really really gotta love it to put up with what it takes to get published and continue to STAY published.

~Linnea

In the past week or so on several different discussions of SFR I’ve heard that being well read in both genres is the key to writing blended or cross-genre fiction. I’d add to that loving both genres is important too. It seems to me you can be well read, and know the tropes, but just not burn for a genre. I think that shows sometimes in books that have all the right nuts and bolts, but no real spark.

Love the Chocolate in my Peanut butter comparison.

Try putting some unsweetened coco powder in your chili with the coves. It’s the secret behind Cincy style Chili, which is either an addition harder to kick than cocaine, or the most repulsive thing ever served over spaghetti noodles depending on your point of view.

I’ve always enjoyed books that blend different genres. After romance, I love a good mystery with my SF (if all three are in a story, I swoon).

I really admire fellow readers like Kathy who are willing to do that research and/or adjust expectations for cross genre books. They can be new territory for us and it does involve some cognitive restructuring, in other words a different way of evaluating a story’s structure.

I think a whole legion of adventurous readers did that for paranormal romance and romantic suspense. So in addition to SF readers and romance readers, there’s a contingent of cross genre readers whose expectations closely match such books. Win win all around, imho.