Chapter Two

Chapter two of Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder is about genre, and if you've ever looked up genre in Wikipedia in an effort to decide what category your latest work in progress falls into, you know that we book writers have what seems like a million to choose from and someone is always coming up with what they think is a new mix or a new evolution of the same thing. According to Blake Snyder, it all can be narrowed down to ten bulk categories. It all goes toward the effort of attracting the attention of an agent or producer in the shortest amount of time - i.e. at a glance.

I'll list and briefly explain the ten genres, and then I'll let you know what I picked. As I can see it so far, this all just might help the rewrite of the book. There's nothing like having a guide on what to focus on as you write your book.

• Monster in the House - is exactly what it says. Someone or something is a monster in a confined area and it simply must be defeated.
• Golden Fleece - is the hero taking to the road in search of whatever and finds himself instead.
• Out of the Bottle - the bottle being something akin to a genie's bottle leading toward the granting of some sort of normally out-of-reach wish.
• Dude with a Problem - is like it says. An ordinary dude who is suddenly face with an extraordinary problem.
• Rite of Passage - is when life throws your average dude a brick, but that's life, now deal with it. How that is accomplished is the story.
• Buddy Love - is two people who hate each other at first but end up loving each other in some way. Yeah, this is every love story in the works, but it's more than that.
• Whydunit - This is more than just your average mystery. It's why. Why did they do what they did? But it's also the agony of putting all the pieces together.
• The Fool Triumphant - is the underdog triumphing against the egotistical big guy.
• Institutionalized - is very group-oriented type story.
• Superhero - is far more than the comic book-type story that might first come to mind. It is also about the very rich or very smart needing to deal with the average people he needs to deal with.

 For my book, I chose Rite of Passage because my hopefully average teenage boy had to figure out what it meant to be a king, and as it turned out, that goal ended up being far more than he could have ever guessed at the beginning. I also think Monster in the House is involved. Harris's entire problem is because of an unseen monster (Kain). I also think Golden Fleece is mixed in. Though not something he initiated himself, Harris takes quite a journey, physically, as well as within himself, in order to become the king it was his blood-right to become.

At some point, I might narrow that down, but it is what it is so far. I'm learning.

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