Quote:
Originally Posted by Vaultboy
I've never liked the term "speculative fiction", because it is too vague and undefined, and because too little of it is not SF to merit its own sub-genre. Alternate reality and Alternative history (which accounts for the majority of non-SF speculative fiction) is found on SF shelves in stores/catalogues anyway. So I regard the speculative fiction sub-genre as defunct.
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You see, this is why I use it as an overarching identifier: "speculative fiction" includes science fiction, fantasy, horror, parallel universes/alternate realities, the occult, etc. It's more or less a distinction from other genres such as literary, historical, mystery, thriller, romance, etc. Of course, you're always going to get crossovers and blends---there's no avoiding that---but I think the term "speculative fiction" works in the way I intend to use it for this book club. This will also explain why I've used the subgenre categories in the OP reading list.