What Is The Best Genre To Write If You Want To Get Published?

Filed under Get Published.

So you are an unpublished writer and you want to get published, which genre gives you the best chance of landing a book deal?

The premise of this post is that the more popular the book genre, the more books that are published and the higher the chance of you landing a book deal. The evidence for this post is all based on a recent Harris Interactive report based on US reading habits.

Fiction or Non-Fiction?

It appears that, of the people who buy at least one book at year, 8 out of 10 buy a fiction book.

Great, fiction it is… but wait.

It is also the case that out of the same group people, 8 out of 10 will also buy a non-fiction book. OK, good news I suppose, suggesting that fiction and non-fiction are equally popular. I am a bit sceptical, but let’s plough on.

Fiction Genres

This is a bit more straight forward, of the people buying at least one fiction book a year, just under half (48%) buy what is classed as Mystery, Thriller and Crime. This is a pretty broad spectrum but gives us some indication of buying trends. Yet, I suspect this will be no surprise. The figure did leave me wondering if mega-writers such as Dan Brown altered buying habits. For example, how many people bought Dan Brown because he is a best seller, but not because they are a fan of his genre? The same goes for J.K. Rowling, I bet a lot of readers buy Harry Potter but no other fantasy.

The second most popular genre was Science Fiction with 26% of readers buying Sci Fi books, ‘Literature’ was close on its heels with 24% and Romance is worthy of a mention with 21% of the market.

Non-Fiction Genres

So for Non-Fiction, of the people buying at least one fiction book a year, the biggest selling genre was history, perhaps no surprise, with 31% of the market. A close second was Biographies with 29% of sales. In third place was Religious and Spirituality with 26%, though I suspect this percentage will be smaller outside the US. The remainder of the marketplace was split between Self-Help, Current Affairs, True Crime, Business and ‘Other non-fiction.’

For me, the surprises in Non-Fiction were the fact that Self-Help made up just 16% of sales and Business a measly 10%. My instinct prior to reading this survey was that these would both sell more. The survey also seems to not include text books and educational books.

Conclusions

My thoughts are that this report simply doesn’t give us enough data to make a definitive decision on which genre is the easiest to get published. Clearly for Fiction, writing ‘Mystery, Thriller and Crime’ will give you a bigger fan base and more potential book deals. The same is true for History in Non-Fiction. Yet, this is a dangerous approach. So many factors go into securing a book deal that simply picking a genre because it has the biggest market is a little bit silly. If nothing else passion for a particular genre goes a long way. I can use myself as an example of an alternative approach. I write children’s history book, with a target audience aged 9-12, and a focus on reluctant readers. Yes, this pigeon holes me and yes it cuts down the readership, but it does allow me to work closely with my agent, whilst developing good relationships with publishers who are interested in this genre.

Any thoughts?

Source

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  • http://twitter.com/AnneLyle Anne Lyle

    Science fiction is actually quite a hard sell at the moment - if you want to get published, you’re much better off writing fantasy. I suspect that, lacking a “fantasy” option on that poll, readers may have ticked the SF box instead.

    Always check the source data for inadvertent bias…

  • Brian Clegg

    In my experience it is a LOT easier to get published in non-fiction than fiction. There are two reasons:

    1) You don’t need an agent. The majority of non-fiction books are sold direct to the publisher. This is one less hurdle to overcome.

    2) Big fish in small pond. If you write fiction, you are going up against every other fiction writer. Even if you write genre fiction, they are very big pools. If you write about 19th century history, say, it’s a much smaller pool. The downside of this is many pools are so small that publishers won’t be interested. But as long as you have the expertise/knowledge to write non-fiction on a subject that will get an audience, you are more likely to get the attention of a publisher.

    I admit the second reason doesn’t apply to everyone - if your only non-fiction is a memoire of life as a shopworker (say) you need something very special to get noticed. But if the second reason does apply to you on a topic with more specialized expertise but a good audience, non-fiction is definitely easier.

  • http://www.lostinthewriting.net Lori Lopez

    I’ve always held to the believe to get published, first have a good, well-though out story line, but even that isn’t enough, it’s all in the execution and editing but most important it seems is persistence. 

  • Jäääärne

    While I don’t claim to know things better than the next person, I’m still convinced that this is an entirely wrong approach. If a person’s sole reason for writing is landing a deal and getting published, from which everything else stems, then they should not bother at all. The end product won’t be good if the author is not interested in what they’re doing. And I don’t think that the publishers are that easy to trick, if the book itself is just not good enough.

  • Anonymous

    Agree… the article is intentionally provocative. However, it was written to try and force writers to consider the market in any writing project they consider.

  • http://bubblecow.net BubbleCow [Gary Smailes]

    I think we have said on this blog more than one that being in the correct place at the correct time is an essential part of any writers journey.

  • http://bubblecow.net BubbleCow [Gary Smailes]

    I agree — I would also add that many non-fiction publishers are able to ‘guess’ the potential commercial value of a book with relative ease. This means that book’s content is more important then the writer (to an extent).

    Do people agree?

  • http://bubblecow.net BubbleCow [Gary Smailes]

    All genres have phases.

  • Jäääärne

    Of course, the market should be considered if an author wants to be able to reach the people who’d want to read their book. However, in this case it probably should be the second step, not the first, and probably should be done a bit differently (say, the author could focus on finding the right agent/publisher for what thee have in mind instead of trying to find the genre that would sell).

  • Alex Washoe

    There’s something very cynical about asking “What genre should I write in to get published”.  In the genres I read, I don’t want to read books by someone who just chose that genre because they thought it was lucrative.  I want to read books by the writers who had an idea and a vision that they were on fire with and wrote it no matter what genre it was.  And by the same token, I don’t want to write in a genre I don’t like or respect just because it’s easy to get published there.  I don’t think fiction worth reading is written this way.

  • Alex Washoe

    There’s something very cynical about asking “What genre should I write in to get published”.  In the genres I read, I don’t want to read books by someone who just chose that genre because they thought it was lucrative.  I want to read books by the writers who had an idea and a vision that they were on fire with and wrote it no matter what genre it was.  And by the same token, I don’t want to write in a genre I don’t like or respect just because it’s easy to get published there.  I don’t think fiction worth reading is written this way.

  • Alex Washoe

    There’s something very cynical about asking “What genre should I write in to get published”.  In the genres I read, I don’t want to read books by someone who just chose that genre because they thought it was lucrative.  I want to read books by the writers who had an idea and a vision that they were on fire with and wrote it no matter what genre it was.  And by the same token, I don’t want to write in a genre I don’t like or respect just because it’s easy to get published there.  I don’t think fiction worth reading is written this way.

  • Alex Washoe

    There’s something very cynical about asking “What genre should I write in to get published”.  In the genres I read, I don’t want to read books by someone who just chose that genre because they thought it was lucrative.  I want to read books by the writers who had an idea and a vision that they were on fire with and wrote it no matter what genre it was.  And by the same token, I don’t want to write in a genre I don’t like or respect just because it’s easy to get published there.  I don’t think fiction worth reading is written this way.

  • Michela

    It would be my guess this is not often the case, in fact I wonder if there are really writers out there so cold and calculating to be able to sit down, work out what sells and write it. There might be, I certainly know none.
    I write what is known as Women’s Fiction (one of the many definition of Romantic Fiction) and it’s definitely a genre that can sell well, but also one that is overcrowded and standing out it’s a hard task. But I write the stories i want to tell, with passion, and as much as I can dream of getting a book deal and go on to have a best seller, that is not what spurs me.