Why Is Identifying Genre So Hard For Me?

It used to be that, whenever I started a new story, I rarely bothered wondering about the genre. It was always classed as fantasy in my mind. I read fantasy, I liked fantasy, therefore I whatever I wrote was fantasy.

It’s been a long time since things were so simply put.

Of course, there’ve been stories when the genre of a novel is obvious, other times it took me a while to agree that a story actually belonged in a different genre. And there’s the tricky one that falls under the glorious term of science fantasy.

Then there’s the damn spellster series where one book is looking to be some sort of terrible, but
somehow sweet, romance. Whereas the other is… Well, I don’t know, actually.

I know it’s not erotica. This is not a story about Dylan’s sexual journey, which is a key point in that genre.
Not that he doesn’t have sex… he has a lot of sex, after around chapter eight, maybe even later. I’ve about seven planned chapters that’ll have such scenes. That’s less than a quarter of the story and I know some won’t be as long, or as detailed, as another.
Some scenes are explicit, though. I’ve two back-to-back chapters dedicated to the MC’s first time with a guy. Close to 10k in total, you can read the draft of those here if you like. But I’ll tell you this: a large part of it has them doing a fair bit of talking, on top of the initial seducing and some fumbling. Sex (actual sex, not just foreplay) doesn’t appear until the second part.

My second choice down the line of raunchy genres is erotic romance, which can be defined as “a romantic relationship that develops through sexual interaction”. That doesn’t quite ring true either. All my stories have an element of romance in them. I can’t help it. Trying to steer any of my stories in another direction leads to character tantrums. But the romance element of In Pain and Blood is a secondary plot and happens more through his interaction outside of sexytimes. So maybe not.

It may simply be that I’ve a fantasy story about a magic-wielding guy who, after believing he’s found his place in the world, winds up trying to discover who’s responsible for the destruction of his troop, part of the king’s army and his old home before they can endanger the kingdom… interspersed with some racy scenes.