When writing a book, you are faced with a plethora of decisions. Most likely while you are writing a book you focus on communicating your thoughts and ideas on paper. You are swept up in your words, characters, and plot lines. While you are writing a book you not only need to examine these details, but see how they fit together as a whole. This will enable you to place your book in a specific “genre”.

What is a genre? The term genre is used in publishing to help categorize your book. In a book store you will find that books are categorized by genre so that you can find a specific book easily. For example, mystery novels are shelved together so if you are a mystery lover, you can sift through this section quickly to find an interesting book.

The main categories of books include adult fiction, adult nonfiction, children’s fiction, and children’s nonfiction. Fiction is further broken down into genres such as mystery, romance, horror, thriller, suspense, new age, etc. It is important to note that there are new genres created every year. For example, “chick lit” and “tween” genres have surfaced in the last few years.

If you are writing a book it is important to determine the genre of your book for several reasons. First, your genre will dictate your marketing plan. If you write a children’s book then you will market it quite differently then a medical reference book.

Determining your genre while writing your book also helps you to ascertain whether your book follows accepted genre standards. You may have intended to write a mystery, but when you finished writing your book it may resemble a horror book instead. Understanding the difference between the mystery and horror genres will help you to place your book in the appropriate market.

If you are undecided as to what type of genre you want to write for then understanding the market for each genre may help steer you in the right direction. Perhaps you are interested in writing two different types of books - a romance book and a mystery book. If you research the current publishing trends and market potential for these books you will find that romance accounts for a massive about of paperback sales. Therefore, you may decide to write a romance book first because the odds of success are higher.

No matter what genre you choose, strive to stay on top of current market information. This will help you to determine if there is a potential market for your book or if the market is already flooded with books like yours.