In the Scroll today: Publishers insist writers stick to one genre. But what if they don’t want to be a ‘genre author’?

Well-meaning folk in the publishing world shake their heads disapprovingly. Stick to a single genre, they advise me. You will confuse your readers. Your readers pick up a book by you, expecting a sunny romance with the mandatory happy ending complete with doves and violins in the background, only to get blindsided by a spooky tale. Will they ever trust you again? Dour marketing teams step in, faces so grim one might think they’d spent the morning drowning puppies. Marketing a multi-genre author is difficult, they say, your books can’t be slotted conveniently on one shelf, they get scattered. Readers who might want to read older books might be disappointed when they realise the previous work is nothing like what they’ve just read. You’re dividing your audience. It hurts your “author brand.”

Read the entire article here