dumb question

[Mr. Tweedy]

Dumb question (and probably one without an answer):

Is there a genre term for a story that contains to magic, high-tech, alien beings, paranormal or other weirdness, but is set in a parallel universe?  If my characters are plain old humans doing regular human stuff on a planet almost exactly like Earth, but it's not Earth, does that make it fantasy, or is it simply fiction?

[eytanz]

Dumb question (and probably one without an answer):

Is there a genre term for a story that contains to magic, high-tech, alien beings, paranormal or other weirdness, but is set in a parallel universe?

I assume this is a typo and you meant "no"?

  If my characters are plain old humans doing regular human stuff on a planet almost exactly like Earth, but it's not Earth, does that make it fantasy, or is it simply fiction?

I think the genre depends on whether the story is happening now or in the future (in which case it's just fiction), or in the past, in which case it's Alternate History. If it takes place in the present/future but the past was still different, it's still Alternate History.

[Mr. Tweedy]

Yes that was a typo.   

The story takes place in Junkin, which is a northerly continent of the planet Barlet, across the Lucas Sea from Mandace, to the east.  The people there have technology similar to that of the depression-era United States, although some nations are less advanced.

Time and location in relation to Earth are unknown and irrelevant.  Is Barlet a planet in our universe or is this a parallel universe?  Don't know.  Don't care.  How did humans come to live there?  Some of it's people think God made them, other think they evolved from ape-like ancestors; no consensus is likely in the foreseeable future.

The idea is that I want the story to be realistic, but I want the setting to be utterly fictitious.

I don't really care what genre that would be: I'm not shooting for a certain label.  I'm just curious what people think.

[eytanz]

Hmmm.... I'm not sure, then. I think the genre would depend more on what the story is, and how transparent its intended message is, than on the setting in this case.

[slic]

The closest, current, popular author I can think of that writes what you describe is Guy Gavriel Kay (The Lions of al-Rassan , Sarantine Mosaic,  The Last Light of the Sun, A Song for Arbonne).  These stories are clearly from a very similar Earth History time period (the map in The Lions of al-Rassan is pretty much Spain and North Africa), but they are absolutely divorced from our history. 

Unlike Alternate History, which basically has all the same "major players" with some key change, these places do not exist in our past.  They are new though somewhat familir.  There was no grand city called Sarantium, this is clearly a nod to ancient Rome.  Mr. Kay says he started this because he had wonderful ideas for stories in these settings but did not want to be tied in anyway to a specific thread. 

I've read most of his work - all of it excellent.

[eytanz]

AFAIK, Sarantium is a far closer parallel - both stylistically and in historical events - to Byzantium, rather than Rome. And Kay does introduce some supernatural elements to his stories - enough to place his stories quite firmly in the "fantasy" genre for me.

But I agree that overall, he makes a good parallel to what Mr. Tweedy is describing.

(I also agree that Kay's work is excellent)

[slic]

Kay has some sort of degree in Byzantium history, so that makes sense - also Sarantium is near the end of it being a great empire, so that fits, as well.

I think they are in the Fantasy section also because of the setting - swords and magic, etc.  The beauty with the supernatural elements is that very rarely is it "magic" (the talking bird) but often the mysticism of the time (the great bison, or the snake lady from The Last Light of the Sun).

Tigana is another excellent book, but clearly there is magic and it is a truly fictional place.

Anyway, what I forgot to mention is that Mr. Kay does not bother with trying any kind of explanation.  As there are no "big" names - no Caesar or King Richard, etc. people are well aware this is fiction.  So, just write the tale without any exposition, it will be figured out by the reader just fine.  Just make sure not to name any characters Truman, Hoover or Roosevelt

[Planish]

The idea is that I want the story to be realistic, but I want the setting to be utterly fictitious.

Huh. That is unusual, to have the fictional setting without any wierdness.
"Fiction", I guess, since a mundane imaginary setting is functionally the same as some obscure real setting the reader is not familiar with. You can get away with anything.

If there are no obvious correspondences between your characters and real people, then I wouldn't consider it "alternate history" or "fictional history", other than the notion that the Depression is common to both.

[Anarkey]

Tigana is another excellent book, but clearly there is magic and it is a truly fictional place.

I think Tigana is meant to be Italy, the way Lions of Al-Rassan is meant to be Spain.

[ClintMemo]

If it takes place in a world that does not exist, I would say it is clearly either fantasy or SF, depending on how you separate those two genres (which is a topic that has already been beaten to death  )

[eytanz]

Tigana is another excellent book, but clearly there is magic and it is a truly fictional place.

I think Tigana is meant to be Italy, the way Lions of Al-Rassan is meant to be Spain.

No; while there are some elements in Tigana borrowed from Italian culture and history, they are relatively minor and play no important role in the story, while the supernatural elements dominate. The more recent books shift the balance in the other direction.

And Tigana is very clearly not in the same world as the more recent novels.

[slic]

I believe what Anarkey meant was that Tigana's societal setting was that of Renissance Italy in the way Spain and North Africa during the time of the Moorish Empire is the setting for Lions of Al-Rassan.

Yes, Mr. Kay mentions Al-Rassan and Sarantium by name in Last Light of the Sun, but that doesn't mean Tigana doesn't belong.  Though I don't think it's meant to...

[Anarkey]

I believe what Anarkey meant was that Tigana's societal setting was that of Renissance Italy in the way Spain and North Africa during the time of the Moorish Empire is the setting for Lions of Al-Rassan.

Yes, precisely.  Thanks for clarifying.  I was vague, assuming people would catch my drift.

Yes, Mr. Kay mentions Al-Rassan and Sarantium by name in Last Light of the Sun, but that doesn't mean Tigana doesn't belong.  Though I don't think it's meant to...

I agree, both Tigana and Fionavar are separate entities, earlier works that don't jive with the rest of the "world" as it is formed in later books  (and I don't think he meant to build a world when he wrote Lions, either...I think he just realized later that he could include the geographies of Lions and Sarantium without breaking anything in the world setting, not as easy with Tigana because it's Italy at a different time/place than Ravenna's glory and the post-plague, both of which figure prominently in Sarantium).  I think if he could have figured a non-cheesy way to retconn it, he would have, though I respect him for not square peg, round holing it.  I also think the mechanisms Kay used to build Fionavar and Tigana are the same ones used in the later books, hence why I made the correlation (Fionavar is France with elves, right?  Haven't read it because ewww France and ewww elves).


Anybody read Ysabel, his latest?  I understand it's set in our world as opposed to a made up one.

[eytanz]

I think Fionvarr - unlike all his other novels - is not inspired by any real world location, but rather by mythology - it's basically "Celtic legendland meets Middle Earth". It also has a framing story of "young college kids get thrown into alternate reality" which, by introducing the real world into the story, makes the relationship be quite clearly "this is where our stories come from" rather than "this is a variation on what happened".

By the way, even though the plot is full of cliches, and the characters were a bit hard for me to relate to, I found Fionvarr a very enjoyable read. Not Kay's best by any means, but if you're in the mood for high-adventure sword-and-sorcery, it's possible to do a lot worse.

[slic]

Anybody read Ysabel, his latest? 

I haven't and really I have no interest.  My understanding from the back cover is that it is about a present day kid who "slips" in some way to past events - not so much time travel as ghosts pressing their agenda.