Secret history
Secret history stories may range from very SFnal to only mildly SFnal. Characteristically they feature a secret conspiracy — often run by an organization — or a secret species; otherwise, supposedly normal life persists. Secret history stories pop up particularly in science fiction. They are, effectively, a subcategory of alternate history; but rather than supposing some major event went another way, they suppose a group of manipulators, hidden conspirators, minor events, unknown events, that conspired to get us here, today, to the place we are.)
- Secret history organizations: The Watchers' Council in Buffy; the Talamasca in Anne Rice; etc.
- Steven Barnes Blood Brothers
- Octavia E. Butler's Wild Seed
- Theodore Roszak's The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein
- Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code
- "Alias"