Signposting genre switches (eg. time travel)

[heidirebecca]

I have a question about signposting something in the first book of a series when you know it will be predominant in the final books of the series.

The reason why I am asking is because, when someone picks up your first book and looks on the backcover to see what it's about, if they see what looks to be an adventure story and then in the next books following there are sci/fi occurrences, would they be put off from reading it because it isn't their genre? Or should you be upfront in the first book about what exactly the readers are going to be in store for, so that you might draw in additional readers who are into that sort of thing?

[Danthia]

Make the first book a great story and worry abouth the rest later. If the story lends itself to hintng a little at where it's going (which is probably does if it's a series) then let those hints come out naturally. If you hook your reader and they love the first book, they'll pick up the second. As long as you continue to hook and entertain them they'll stay with you.

One caveat...
If you suddenly pull out sci fi elements and they don't track with anything else up to that point, you'll risk throwing your reader for a loop. This could result in them putting it aside. But if they appear and you're reader thinks, "oh! I should have realized that from X Y and Z" then you're fine.

[SageFury]

The simple answer:

If your story is great no one will care what genre it is.

My grandfather is old western for stories and my fantasy adventure broke him free from that state of mind =)

[Soccer Mom]

The simple answer:

If your story is great no one will care what genre it is.

My grandfather is old western for stories and my fantasy adventure broke him free from that state of mind =)

Yes, but you must play fair with your audience. If the story seems straight up adventure and three books in your s/f elements suddenly appear, this can break your readers' trust that you know what you're doing. You have to lay the groundwork so that the readers know that this story might go there.

[DeleyanLee]

The reason why I am asking is because, when someone picks up your first book and looks on the backcover to see what it's about, if they see what looks to be an adventure story and then in the next books following there are sci/fi occurrences, would they be put off from reading it because it isn't their genre? Or should you be upfront in the first book about what exactly the readers are going to be in store for, so that you might draw in additional readers who are into that sort of thing?

Sorry, it just might be my cold keeping me from seeing the obvious, but--who reads the back of the book to see what genre something is? Isn't that obvious by where the book is shelved, or by what's written on the spine?

Adventure and SF elements are NOT mutually exclusive. (James Bond, anyone?) As long as you continue to give them the main genre it's shelved in (Adventure, I assume) and set up the SF elements in the course of the story, I don't see where the problem is, honestly.

Am I missing something and just need to go back to bed? (which sounds pretty good, actually....)

[heidirebecca]

Sorry, it just might be my cold keeping me from seeing the obvious, but--who reads the back of the book to see what genre something is? Isn't that obvious by where the book is shelved, or by what's written on the spine?

Particularly in Young Adult fiction, everything is stored together. People know what they like to read, they go looking for the certain covers that fit their genre (eg. You've got girly teen coming of age books, wizardy books, a few adventure books, some literary books that generally have won awards concerning racism etc., and so on). Every time I go to that section, I will scan the back cover.