Pick a Best-Selling Genre, Sell Books
Picking the right genre for your story is crucial. This important decision can affect your ability to reach the right readers. With such a vast number of genres in the world of literature, it’s not easy choosing the best one.
But what if you want to reverse engineer your book? To write a great book that will sell well. To do that, you may want to pick your book’s genre upfront. Then write a book that fits the genre, whether it’s the easiest genre to write in or the hardest.
What genre will get your book to the top of the charts? Here are five of the best-selling book genres that readers can’t get enough of.
Fall in Love with Romance
If you’re looking for a genre that makes the most money, look no further than romance. Through the years, romance continues to be the most popular and profitable book genre. How well does it do? The romance world rakes in $1 billion a year, covering a third of the entire fiction market.
From an outside perspective, this best-selling genre is also considered easier to write. That’s because unlike some genres, romance novels typically follow a simple formula. The story begins with a protagonist, who somehow meets a love interest. A conflict is then introduced, which prevents the two of them from immediately being together. The rest of the story is spent overcoming the conflict. Though it may seem a simple formula, mastering the genre is no easy task.
The romance genre has a massive following as readers tend to stay loyal to their favorite authors. While most romance readers are women, romance novels are also loved by men. Popular romance subgenres include fantasy romance, historical romance, contemporary romance, and paranormal romance.
Consider Self-Help Books
While romance is the best-selling fiction genre, self-help books are one of the most popular non-fiction genres. The primary goal of these books is to help readers to develop personally, emotionally, or spiritually.
Because of the wide variety covered within self-help books, this genre provides an author a lot of possibilities. Whether you want to write about how to set goals, manage stress, or improve your relationships with others, self-help has you covered.
The self-improvement market includes various demographics worldwide. According to Market Research.com, this industry is estimated to grow to $13.2 billion by 2022.
Many self-help books concern leadership, career or business success, and wealth acquisition. Meanwhile, other books incorporate religious doctrine or offer advice for tackling life problems from a spiritual perspective. What will yours be about?
Give Them Mystery & Crime
Mystery and crime novels are often fiction, but a number are non-fiction. This best-selling genre draws rabid readers, whether a particular novel is standalone or part of a more extensive series.
The structure of a mystery novel is what keeps readers interested and engaged. It starts with a thrilling hook and suspenseful pacing. The build-up, surprises, and even the letdowns are all part of the fun until it ends with a conclusion that will answer all of the reader’s questions.
Mystery novels can be easily adapted into films, series, comic books, graphic novels, and online interactive stories. These adaptations help make the genre even more popular among audiences worldwide. They also help pad the wallets of hungry writers.
The best-selling mystery subgenres include true crime novels, detective stories, police procedurals, cozy mysteries, historical mysteries, and scientific mysteries.
Space Out on Science Fiction & Fantasy
These best-selling book genres allow your readers to escape into a fictional, mystical land. Science fiction (sci-fi) and fantasy novels are closely related in several ways. Both genres are considered speculative fiction, which tends to have a large number of creative and imaginary elements.
Fantasy is an old genre that often features magical or supernatural creatures. This is where you’ll find witches, dragons, elves, and wizards. Additionally, fantasy novels are typically set in a different time period.
Science fiction is a relatively new genre featuring stories usually based on science. Common themes or elements include time travel, space exploration, robots, aliens, and paranormal activities.
Sci-fi novels can take place in a dystopian past, but many stories are set in the future, dealing with the consequences of scientific and technological advancement.
Some popular subgenres under the sci-fi or fantasy category are sword and sorcery, epic fantasy, dark fantasy, urban fantasy, high fantasy, and steampunk.
Scream at Horror & Thrillers
Horror and thriller books often overlap and mix other genres, such as crime, mystery, fantasy, or even romance. This genre is perfect for readers who are fascinated with the supernatural, paranormal, and scary side of life.
Horror and thriller books maintain a large readership each year due with stories that feature shock and suspense for the audience. The list of best-selling thriller books is dominated by authors like Dan Brown and David Baldacci. Meanwhile, Stephen King is acknowledged as the master of contemporary horror because of his well-loved collection of spine-chilling titles.
Write Your Next Best-Selling Book
Now that you know what the best-selling book genres are, it’s time to get those creative juices flowing and start working on your novel. Who knows? Your book might end up on the list of best-sellers someday.
Need help getting it there? Take the first step by submitting your book to us for consideration.
