On genre and gender

On By Luther M. SilerIn Reading, Writing

Had an interesting conversation on Twitter (shut up, that’s a real thing) the other day with another writer that started off with him asking this:

Now, I’ve had this conversation and this exact thought before: either there are not enough women writing in those genres, or (vastly more likely) I’m not reading enough of their work.  If I went through my shelves and started writing down names, I’d probably write down a couple dozen before running out of names.  That’s not enough.

This isn’t why I’m bringing the conversation up on the blog, though.  I literally couldn’t think of a single female author who qualified in my head as a “horror writer.”  Not one.  Lauren Beukes, who wrote last year’s The Shining Girls, sorta qualified, but I thought of her stuff more as supernatural crime fiction.

Did you catch the move I did there?  I kept thinking about it over the course of the evening and eventually it hit me that I couldn’t name more than two or three male horror writers, especially if I limited myself to writers who were still alive.  Stephen King.  Dean Koontz.  Clive Barker.  My wife tossed Christopher Pike, who I haven’t read, into the mix.

Of the four, the only one whose work I’m still regularly reading is King, and at least two of his last several books (Joyland and Mr. Mercedes) have explicitly not been horror.

Eventually it hit me that, at least in my head, and with respect to novels, “horror” as a fiction genre seems to barely exist on its own anymore.  I found this list from last February (did you know February is “Women in Horror Month”?) and found several authors who I’m quite fond of or at least familiar with– Cherie Priest, Mira Grant, Cat Rambo, Catherynne Valente, Elizabeth Bear, Patricia Briggs, Laurell Hamilton and a couple of others– and the only ones who I thought “yeah, okay, she’s a horror writer” where Hamilton and Briggs– who are the two I haven’t read.

In every other case, including when the list specifically referenced books I’d read, I thought to myself “Huh.  I thought that was (insert other genre here.)”

Which is weird, right?  Horror (at least to me) seems to be something that exists as an element inside books of other genres, as opposed to something that is a genre unto itself.  I’m not even sure I know anymore what it would take for me to read something and think “Yeah, that’s a horror novel.”

I don’t know that I even really have a direct point for this post other than to ask who you guys think of as “horror writers” or maybe less specifically as “horror books.”  This doesn’t have to be limited to women; the conversation started off that way but as I said it quickly got beyond that point when I realized I could barely name any horror writers of either genre. (Late edit: the Faceyspace has already brought up Mary Shelley; I’m mostly thinking of living authors right now.)

(Note:  Beukes herself popped up on the thread a bit later to suggest a few other writers– Sarah Lotz, Sarah Pinborough, and Kaaron Warren, none of whom I’m familiar with and who I’ll have to look into.  Just FYI.)

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9 thoughts on “On genre and gender”

  2. I am a child of the 80s. I don’t read this genre regardless the author….unless you count children’s literature and the Harry Potter series….ha ha…..Death Seekers!!!!! Head shrinking! Spells! I loved every bit of this “Satanic romp.” Not so Satanic to me, mind you. So to your question I have nothing to offer other than a memory of a few horror movies of my time: The Shining, Exorcist, and Carrie. These still haunt me, as does the St. Bernard I spent the night with the time I saw the Exorcist. Ahhhhh! In this last one, Carrie, isn’t vehicular homicide and arson administered by a psycho girl on her period? Kinda fuzzy in my mind except for when it’s my time of the month, OR when I drive to Salt Lake City through the construction zone during wildfire season! Ha! Good luck Ape and all. 🙂

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  3. It has nothing to do with the 80’s but I rarely read horror. I’m sure it comes from my dad finding it great fun to scare the shit out of me when I was a kid. After watching dinosaurs or monsters on TV he got a kick out of jumping in the dark hallway. Don’t think he was mean, it was funny. I think Stephen King is one of the most talented writers around and gives such great advice on writing.

    As for women. Since I began to publish my own books a number of years ago I’ve found that women are some of the most talented in almost any genre. And they read all genres and give great reviews–good or bad. They are usually kinder than men and give reasons why. I know several who write in the Vampire genre that will keep you awake at night.

    Great post

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  4. I would consider Ann Rice a horror writer. I would also consider Laurell Hamilton a horror writer–at least her earlier books.

    I do think that people made more of a big deal about there being sex in their books because they are women, Stephen King has a lot of sex, and no one considers him anything other than a horror writer. James Herbert and Clive Barker have a lot of sex, and very kinky sex, in their books.

    I think that the “there are no women in horror” is a self-fulfilling prophecy. When women do write horror (and let me throw out Kate Wilhelm and Tanith Lee, both of whom wrote excellent horror novels) a serious effort has been made to find something else to call it.

    Honestly, I don’t think that there would be a “paranormal romance” genre if it weren’t for that desire to find something else to call horror when it is written by a woman.

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    1. The funny thing is that there is a post in the Twitter conversation above where I remember Anne Rice exists and call us both idiots for forgetting about her, only to do the EXACT SAME THING for the post. Sigh.

      Adding Kate Wilhelm and Tanith Lee to my “look for” list, especially since I really like the name “Tanith.”

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  6. pjsandchocolate's avatar pjsandchocolate

    To this day I still can’t watch Luke Skywalker lose his hand. I’ve seen movies far worse than that, but something about that moment in that movie is just hard. My parents tell me I cried in the backseat during that scene, so maybe barely 4 was a hair too young for it. I can watch right up to a moment before and pick it up a moment later, but something about that one moment is just too much.

    I think horror is a very individual definition as opposed to, say, romance. Some are terrified of being blinded permanently. For others, a fictional rape scene is too much. A dystopic future in which there are people who just accept it and pretend everything is beautiful when they know it isn’t is something that can make the blood run cold for people like my husband.

    So, I think writing true horror is incredibly difficult and that’s why there may not be that many horror writers out there, male or female – What scares the hell out of you is not necessarily the same thing for the other guy.

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