“I’m looking for a mystery,” my agent said.
From The Millions, essay by Kim Wright.
Fascinating read, but I was especially interested in this next quote, given how often we MTSers struggle with definitions in our genre:
“You might call Dawn Tripp’s Game of Secrets a ‘psychological thriller’ but that somewhat misses the mark,” says Patriarche. “It’s a thrilling book, but does it play by the rules of a thriller? The problem is we don’t have names for these books, so we call them by the old names, even when the terms don’t fit.” But like any good publicist, she’s prepared to find the opportunity in the midst of the crisis. “It’s hard to get publicity for any book these days, especially one that’s hard to label, but a book that straddles genres can actually be an opportunity for a publicist to open it up to the readership of both genres.”
There's more in the last paragraph about the blending of genres. Good stuff.