Urban fantasy

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  • Peter S. Beagle, 2011: "[A]s a subgenre, as a kind, as a trope, I still think that urban fantasy's most important distinction is that it isn't The Lord of the Rings: that is, it doesn't happen in a comfortable rural, pre-industrial setting where people still ride horses, swing swords, quaff ale in variously sinister pubs, and head off apocalypses and Armageddons that would a Buffy episode look like a tussle in a schoolyard. Not that that's a bad thing... What I am clear on is that, while I wasn't looking, urban fantasy has become so vibrant, and has evolved so rapidly, that it has emerged as a distinct marketing category, often with its own section in the bookstore. Because of that rapid growth the term means different things to different generations of readers. There have, in fact, been three distinct subgenres of urban fantasy: mythic fiction, paranormal romance, and noir fantasy.

    ... The first popularization of the term urban fantasy (later rechristened by Charles de Lint and Terri Windling as mythic fiction), appearing in the mid to late 1980s, was used to apply to the work of writers such as de Lint, Emma Bull, Windling, and Will Shetterly, who wrote contemporary stories in which myths and fairy tales intruded into everyday life. ...

    ... And then there was Buffy. The much-deserved success of Buffy the Vampire Slayer meant that vampires, werewolves, and demons of all varieties -- including the sort who were either as tormented about what they were as any teenager or as forlornly anxious to fit in -- were suddenly fictional legal tender once again. A second wave of urban fantasy overtook the first: paranormal romance, in all of its dark, tawdry, and dysfunctional glory. These creatures of the night knew exactly what they'd become, and were at least half-aware that they were symbols and metaphors for the American experience. Our heroine, walking through the empty subway station, is no longer the meek shrinking-violet of previous generations. She is precocious, athletic, sexually aware, and regards kicking demonic ass, in Buffy's words, as 'comfort food.' (emphasis added) ....

    ... The third generation of urban fantasy, noir fantasy, hearkens to a call for more realism, as exemplified by the novels of Charlie Huston. ....

    ... Urban fantasy counts on familiarity with mythology, fairy tales, and the earliest horror tropes like vampires, werewolves, and warlocks -- in the same way that science fiction relies on faster-than-light drives and sentient robots -- as shorthand to pull the reader through familiar territory quickly without wasting precious time."[1]


  • Laura Quilter, 2007-2010: Key indicator is mix of fairy tale elements (often seen in pastoral or rural settings) with specifically urban elements; a recognizable city, skyscrapers, public transit, congestion, large populations, urban blight, etc. The first works in the broad "urban fantasy" genre tended to involve faery or other magical intrusions into modern urban life; the genre overlaps with magical realism and with elfpunk. Over time, the genre has come to be dominated by works drawing from vampire literature, particularly Anne Rice, frequently with a female protagonist, and featuring sexual or romantic situations. These novels may overlap with paranormal romance's, or, as with the books by Laurell K. Hamilton (one of the founders of this sub-sub-genre), a sort of paranormal "chick-lit".


Works of Urban Fantasy

elf-punk, mythic fantasy, & others

"paranormal chick-lit"

Can be broken down further into

(A) Noir fantasy / Urban fantasy mystery. -- Mystery-oriented. Protagonists often either (a) kick-ass female protagonists, often with multiple lovers, often in a series of books. These frequently incorporate romantic elements, but often in the service of ongoing sexual tension, romantic triangles, etc.; or (b) world-weary cynical Dashiel Hammett-like investigators.
(B) paranormal romance -- generally one True Love (often a very alpha male type character) and a HEA ("happily-ever-after"); mystery plot or worldbuilding may be secondary to the romance in the individual books. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the romance market saw an explosion in publishers and writers' use and marketing of paranormal, science fictional, and other speculative / non-realist elements in romance novels.


kick-ass female protagonist series


paranormal romance series

Further reading


notes

  1. ↑ Introduction, The Urban Fantasy Anthology, edited by Peer S. Beagle and Joe R. Lansdale (2011, Tachyon Publications).
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