The Formulas of Popular Fiction: Elements of Fantasy, Science Fiction, Romance, Religious and Mystery Novels

by Anna Faktorovich

This book creates a taxonomy for the major currently popular and bestselling fictional genres: romance (Heyer, Cartland, Woodiwiss and Roberts), religious and inspirational (Corelli and Douglas), mystery and detective (Conan Doyle, Christie and Mankell), and science fiction, horror and fantasy (Wells, Tolkien, Orwell, Niven, King and Rowling, among others). Each of the main chapters looks at the history of a generic form from its earliest roots to its most recent works. The structural patterns in the plot, characters and setting of these genres are then explained. The book also contains a critique of currently popular hyper-formulaic, hack, unliterary writings that have multiplied in recent decades under the guise of generic conventions. There are also sections on special topics such as the publishing oligopoly and the resulting homogeneity among bestselling works, and the steady movement from literary to unliterary fiction.

224 pages, Paperback

First published June 15, 2014

About the author

Anna Faktorovich is the Director and Founder of the Anaphora Literary Press. She taught college English at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, Edinboro University of Pennsylvania and the Middle Georgia State College. She has a Ph.D. in English Literature and Criticism. She published two academic books with McFarland: "Rebellion as Genre in the Novels of Scott, Dickens and Stevenson" (2013) and "The Formulas of Popular Fiction: Elements of Fantasy, Science Fiction, Romance, Religious and Mystery Novels" (2014). Her British Renaissance Re-Attribution and Modernization Series, https://anaphoraliterary.com/attribution changes world-history. She has been editing and writing for the independent, tri-annual Pennsylvania Literary Journal since 2009. And she started the second Anaphora periodical, Cinematic Codes Review, in 2016. She has presented her research at the MLA, SAMLA, EAPSU, SWWC, BWWC and many other conferences. She won the MLA Bibliography, Kentucky Historical Society and Brown University Military Collection fellowships.