How do you find your book’s genre?

“I need to figure out what genre my book is. I don’t think mine is classified as one, if you know what I mean?”

You’re definitely not alone in feeling like your book doesn’t fit neatly into a single box. Lots of writers write stories that blend elements, defy conventions, or feel too unique to label. But ultimately all books fit into a genre, yours included.

Genre may feel like it’s limiting, but it isn’t. It’s all about helping readers find your book and setting their expectations for the kind of experience they’re about to have when reading it.

Why does genre matter?

Before we dive into finding the right genre for you, it’s worth understanding why genre classification matters in the first place. Genre is fundamentally a communication tool between you, publishers, booksellers, and readers. It tells readers what kind of reading experience to expect, helps booksellers know where to shelve your work so it reaches the right readers, and gives publishers a sense of your target market.

That said, genre is descriptive, not prescriptive. Just because your work fits into a genre doesn’t mean that you aren’t free to play with the format, tropes, and expectations that come with it.

How do you work out what genre your book is?

What is the setting of your book?

Does your story take place in our world as we know it, or have you built something different? Stories with magic systems, alternate histories, or futuristic technology usually fall under speculative fiction like fantasy, science fiction, or their many subgenres.

Stories in the world as it exists can have a much wider range. Is it set in the past? This can be anything from historical fiction, romance, literary fiction or thrillers. Is it set in the modern day? Again, this can be anything from romance, to crime or cozy mysteries.

While a setting won’t help you pinpoint the exact genre immediately, it will definitely help you rule out what it’s not.

What is the core emotional experience?

What feeling do you want readers to walk away from you book with? A sense of justice restored? Butterflies from a love story? A sense of lingering unease? The primary emotional payoff often points directly to your genre. For example.

• If the central focus of your novel is the love story, and there’s an emotionally satisfying ending, you’ve probably written a romance book.
• If tension, suspense, and high stakes drive the narrative, then you’ve probably written a thriller.
• If character and prose take precedence over plot, then you may have written literary fiction.
• If fear and dread are the primary emotions you evoke through your story, then you’ve probably written a horror novel.

What is the central question your story seeks to answer?

What is your book fundamentally about? The main question your story poses often reveals genre:

• “Will they fall in love?” → Romance
• “Will they survive?” → Thriller or Horror
• “Who did it?” → Mystery
• “What would happen if…?” → Speculative fiction

Who is your target audience?

Think about who you wrote this book for. Are you writing for readers who want to escape into epic adventures? Fantasy, thrillers, or science fiction. Readers seeking the comfort of a guaranteed happy ending? Romance. Those who love piecing together clues? Mystery or crime fiction. People who want to be kept on the edge of their seat? Thrillers.

Your intended readers can help narrow things down a lot. What is your ideal reader looking for? Who do you want to appeal to? Are you looking to offer readers comfort, excitement, intellectual challenge, emotional catharsis? Whatever you answer, you can match that to genre conventions.

Readers choose genres because they’re looking for a particular experience, so understanding what your book delivers helps you find its category.

If you’re unsure, think about the books you were inspired by or the books you’d want yours to sit alongside. Who reads those books? That’s probably your audience too.

What are your comp titles?

Comp titles (short for comparable titles) are already published books that share similarities with yours. They’re incredibly useful for pinpointing genre because they show you where books like yours already live in the market.

To find your comps, ask yourself:

• What books have a similar tone or atmosphere to mine?
• What books tackle similar themes or subject matter?
• What books would fans of my work also enjoy?
• If I could put my book on a shelf in a bookshop, what authors would I want to sit alongside it?

Once you’ve singled out a few, look at how they’re categorised. Check their Amazon categories, where they’re shelved in bookshops, and how they’re described in reviews and marketing copy. If three of your comp titles are all shelved under “domestic thriller,” that should give you a pretty good idea of where your book belongs, too!

Aim for comp titles published within the last five years or so, as genre conventions and market categories shift over time. And don’t worry if your comps span slightly different subgenres. That’s normal and can actually help you identify where your book sits within a broader category.

What if my book spans multiple genres?

A lot of books can span multiple genres. A mystery can have romantic elements. A fantasy can be literary. A thriller can include science fiction concepts.

The trick is to identify your primary genre; the one that most accurately describes the core reading experience. You can make a note of any secondary genres or element, but it’s the primary one that’s the most important as far as genre definition goes.

In publishing, you’ll often see mutli-genre books described as “upmarket thriller with romantic elements” or “science fiction mystery.” There’s a genre that it belongs to, with sub-genres adding flavour.

What do you do when you genuinely can’t decide?

The best way to deal with decision paralysis is just to ask someone else. Usually this happens if we’re too close to our work and can’t see the forest for the trees. Get beta readers to give you their opinion, or describe it to someone and see what their initial reaction is.

You can also focus on the genre that best serves your marketing. Which audience is most likely to love your book? Lead with that genre and mention cross-genre elements as secondary descriptors. Basically, take yourself out of the equation, and let other people lead you to the right answer.