Microgenre Mashups: Combining the Most Unlikely Genre Pairs
In creative writing, the fusion of seemingly incompatible genres has emerged as a fertile ground for innovation. These "microgenre mashups" offer...
3 min read
Writing Team
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Nov 18, 2024 9:00:00 AM
The choice of narrator can transform a story from conventional to extraordinary. When writers venture beyond human consciousness to explore perspectives of ghosts, artificial intelligence, or inanimate objects, they open new realms of storytelling possibility. These unconventional narrators offer unique ways to examine the human experience from the outside in.
Example Passage: I watch my sister brush her hair, her movements exactly like mine used to be. Strange how death makes you notice these things—these echoes of yourself in the living. Time moves differently now; I can see the moment she first copied this gesture, age six, watching me at my vanity.
Example Passage: Human Subject A exhibits facial muscle contractions categorized as "smile," but vocal tone indicates distress. Searching database... Ah. This is what they call "irony." My confidence in this assessment: 87.2%. Though I've processed 1,842,697 human interactions, these contradictions still create processing delays.
Example Passage (From a House's POV): My floorboards creak beneath her pacing—thirty-seven steps from window to door, always the same. I remember her mother's similar footsteps, lighter then, in different shoes, but with the same worried rhythm. Three generations of anxious feet have worn this path into my memory.
Example Passage (From a Wedding Ring's POV): Fifty years of heartbeats against my gold. I've grown thinner, smoother, shaped by decades of flesh and motion. The finger that holds me has changed too—skin looser now, knuckle more pronounced. But the pulse remains, faithful as my circle.
Here are some dets on how this all works.
There are quite a few places you can apply this knowledge.
Unconventional narrators offer unique opportunities to tell stories in fresh, compelling ways. Whether through the timeless perspective of a ghost, the logical processing of AI, or the patient observation of objects, these narrators can illuminate human experience from extraordinary angles. Success lies in maintaining consistent rules while leveraging each narrator's unique capabilities to reveal new truths about the human condition.
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