Introduction

What Is genre?

a kind of literary or artistic work
a style of expressing yourself in writing
a class of artistic endeavor having a characteristic form or technique.
Genre originates from the French word meaning "kind" or "type". As a literary device, genre refers to a form, class, or type of literary work.

Genres—defined

The two major categories, or genres, in literature are fiction (things, events, and characters that are imagined, created) and nonfiction (about things, events, and people based on fact).
From these two major categories, we can classify further. Fiction, for example, can be divided into poetry, drama (plays), or prose. Those categories tell us something about the form of the work.
But we also classify fiction according to layout and style. There are picture books (graphic novels), which contain words and pictures, novellas or short novels, and short stories, which are much shorter than novellas, as well as novels of course.
Finally, fiction can be classified by content and theme. Here is where we find common genres: adventure stories, science fiction/fantasy, mystery, horror, romance, realistic fiction, and historical fiction.
Keep in mind: genre categories aren’t always clear-cut. A crime/mystery story can be set in the future (science fiction) or in the past (historical fiction). [from Read-Write-Think—NCTE]

Genres

Genre is what some might call “typified rhetorical action”; which means that certain features are repeated again and again, over time, with few differences, in part because audiences expect certain things to happen or because they want certain kinds of experiences.
Genre is the name we use to describe the categories that have developed over time for what we read, what we watch, and what we listen to.
And the kinds of genres that exist in one culture at one time may not exist in another culture at another time—they're constantly changing.

Epic Novel

Epic is a narrative genre characterized by its length, scope, and subject matter. The defining characteristics of the genre are mostly derived from its roots in ancient epics (poems such as Homer's Iliad and Odyssey).
But the epic is no longer limited to the traditional medium of oral poetry, and has expanded to include modern mediums including film, theater, television shows, novels, and video games.
The use of epic as a genre, specifically epic poetry, dates back millennia, all the way to the Epic of Gilgamesh, widely agreed to be the first epic.
Over time literary historians have attempted to clarify the core characteristics of the “epic” genre, primarily over the past two centuries as new mediums for storytelling emerged with developing technologies.
Most significantly, with the advent of the novel, and such classics as Tolstoy's War and Peace, the term began to be applied to novels.

Epic Novel

The nebulous definitions assigned to even the long-standing ancient epics are still a topic of discourse for today's literary academics, and have created difficulties for those attempting a decisive definition for the umbrella term of “epic” as a genre.
First, the classic epic poems were about people whose personal qualities were considered “exemplary” in their culture, civilization, or country: in other words, heroes, like Achilles and Odysseus.
Second, they took place in settings considered “universal” in one way or another: either the narrative takes place over a wide range of places and times, involves a lot of travel, or uses a single place, like the Walls of Troy, to explore ideas and themes that range widely over human experience.
Third, these early epics also invoked deities or the supernatural (Athena, Zeus, Ares, and the like). [Source: Oregon State Univ.]

Epic Novel

Finally, an epic is often used or read as a foundational cultural text. This last quality is incredibly important. The Iliad and the Odyssey—long poems about heroes doing heroic deeds, helped or hindered by the gods—ultimately came to “represent” something about a culture to itself: they were the ideals that people wanted to live up to or rebelled against by rejecting.
Today, an epic is an epic if it’s a long story about a hero that serves as an organizing point of cultural or social identity.
It might be used to describe any creative media that has a broad scope, that speaks broadly to the human condition, that is long or large, and that is ambitious in its artistic goals.
Over time, then, the connotations of the word “epic” have come to be identified not with form (oral poetry) but with the notion of being large, and looming large culturally.

Epic Novel

This description might sound overly broad, but that’s how it goes with defining a genre: the texts we identify within a genre are always changing, and so our ideas of the genre. No epic obeys all of the conventions, and that’s a testament to the immense creativity of storytellers.
Previously, we read Cold Mountain, by Charles Frasier, frequently cited as an epic novel because it deals with the American Civil War, particularly the aftermath for its wounded hero Inman who wants just to return home.
He escapes from the hospital and undertakes the journey, encountering a wide variety of characters along the way, who provide a wide variety of experiences, often tests or trials, before he finally arrives home.
It is an adventure, a troublesome journey, fraught with danger and challenges that test both his moral and physical fortitude. He learns lessons along the way, proves his worth as a human being. You might say the novel is a parable for life itself.

Epic Novel

Kate Grenville's Secret River might also be called epic because its subject matter takes on the origins of Australian civilization, particularly the treatment of its indigenous people by the early settlers.
Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale also readily qualifies as epic because it's the story of two French women who deal with the German occupation of their country during WWII, and their diverse responses to the enemy.
I'm particularly interested in the latter two novels because they would be considered "female epics."

Historical novel

Set in a particular place and time, the historical novel "attempts to convey the spirit, manners, and social conditions of a past age with realistic detail and fidelity (which is in some cases only apparent fidelity) to historical fact."
The work may deal with actual historical personages, or it may contain a mixture of fictional and historical characters.
It may focus on a single historic event; more often it attempts to portray a broader view of a past society in which the private lives of fictional individuals are impacted by significant historical events. (Britannica)
Literary historians have long cited Sir Walter Scott’s Waverley (1814) as the first example of an historical novel; more recently, this designation has been questioned, and Walter Scott's novels are more recently cited as an example of historical romance.
Kate Grenville's The Secret River brought on the "history wars" in Australia, now resolved, but the question of fact versus fiction remains a debatable premise with historical novels. As a result, many of today's authors are quite explicit about what is fact and what is fiction in their novels.

Historical novel

"Though some historical novels, such as Tolstoy’s War and Peace are of the highest artistic quality, many other novels are written to mediocre standards. It's a popular and best-selling genre.
We've read many historical novels during this course, including Kate Quinn's The Rose Code about the women at Bletchley Park, and The Alice Network about the French "fleur du mal" during WWII, as well as Clark and Division about the Japanese internment camps, Salt Creek, about early Australian settlement, Geraldine Brooks' Horse, and many others.
One type of historical novel is the purely escapist costume romance, which, making no pretense to historicity, uses a setting in the past to lend credence to improbable characters and adventures." (Britannica) [we don't read those.]

Epistolary Novel

The epistolary novel is a literary genre in which writers use letters, journals, and diary entries to tell their stories. Although the usual format of epistolary is letters, writers sometimes use other documents such as newspaper clippings and diary entries. Recently, writers also use electronic documents like emails, blogs, radio broadcasts, and recordings.
The epistolary form can add realism to a narrative because it imitates real life and describes different points of view. The letters give readers an intimate view of a character's feelings and thoughts, without interference from the author.
Also, when letters by different authors describe the same event, they provide different perspectives that give the story verisimilitude and dimension.
Generally, point of view in an epistolary novel is first-person. But first-person narratives are limited to the point of view, attitudes, perspectives, insights of that writer. They can recount only what they know from first-hand experience, or what they have been told. Although first-person narrators are generally reliable, this narrative form has been subverted and the primary narrator may not be reliable.

Epistolary Novel

As readers read what the letter writers have written, they develop a sense of that character as a person, complete with personality, background, biases and quirks. In that sense, readers construct the characters. The author has constructed the letters, but the reader constructs the character based on the content of the letters.
And readers also construct the plot or narrative by piecing together the facts of an event compiled from the letters of various characters. Typically, each letter writer has pieces of the puzzle, but not the whole picture. The reader constructs the narrative by putting together the various pieces contributed by each character, weeding out what he or she knows is probably just that letter writer's personal construct.
Best example: Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

Memoir

Also called narrative non-fiction, a memoir is the story of someone's life that generally covers only a specific period in that person's life; often it also has a theme.
Although good memoirs explore and reflect on a central theme or question, they rarely conclude with explicit answers to those questions. Instead, they invite readers to explore and reflect with the narrator to try to unravel the deeper significance of the recounted events.
People write memoirs when they have true personal stories that they hope will inspire others. Readers expect memoirs to help them encounter perspectives and insights that are fresh and meaningful.
Whereas an autobiography tells the entire story of a person's life, a memoir tends to focus on a specific time period or theme.
Memoirs are also subjective; they reflect the perspective of the author. Autobiographies tend to be more objective, focusing on facts, although the lines can blur.
For example, The Diary of Anne Frank is both memoir and autobiography, as is I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

Types of memoirs

Personal Transformation--the most common type of memoir, in which the author tells the story of an episode in their life, such as their childhood, an illness, or a personal relationship that transformed their life. It focuses on the challenges they faced, and overcame.
Professional or celebrity—someone who is famous, for a variety of reasons, focuses on the path that led to their success
Travel or adventure—as the name suggests, this type of memoir focuses on the lessons learned through a certain adventure or trip. Whether it is climbing Mount Everest, going to the North Pole, or camping in the forest for months, these authors share not only the specific details of the trip, but the impact of the trip on their lives, perspectives, beliefs, attitudes. Peter Mathieson's The Snow Leopard is one example.

Types of memoirs

Spiritual Quest—this type of memoir recounts the journey of self-discovery or finding one's purpose. Spiritual quests can focus on religious values or simply the idea of faith and peace in general. Snow Leopard also fits this category, as does Eat, Pray, Love.
Portrait memoirs—different from the others. Although written in first-person, it is not about the author but about someone the author is close to or who plays an important role in the author's life.

Mystery Novels

The detective story originated in the mid-nineteenth century (Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle, also Edgar Alan Poe). Although its basic form has remained intact, the genre has branched into numerous subgenres: espionage, gothic, psychological suspense, police procedural, courtroom, whodunit, the conspicuously British drawing room mystery, and even to a certain degree the horror story. Each form has its practitioners, each its fans.
Sometimes elements of these various genres are combined, themes are often intermingled, and mystery aficionados—who tend to stick with what they like--can experience difficulty locating stories or novels in their particular favorite genre.
Many stories of mystery and detection, having served their ephemeral purposes, quickly fade from memory. A smaller quantity so accurately capture the prevailing social and moral climate and explore so precisely the dark mysteries of the human heart that they become permanently absorbed into our consciousness. (NY Public Library)