There can be books where the zombies are zombies, and books where the zombies are metaphors, and books where the zombies are both, and that we as readers, and writers, and critics, ought to trust those books – rather than any of the labels that get put on them – to tell us how they ought to be read.~ Fantasy Matters
Every new book has an obligation to teach us how to read it, and a good book does that without making us realize it.
Genre can be a helpful shortcut as a tool to help publishers and bookseller market a work, to guide readers toward a general set of characteristics in a work, or to provide writers with a structure to build on or deconstruct. But, as the author of the above quote suggests, they aren’t a very helpful tool for thinking about a work or assessing its value.
[With thanks to @jcarney for the link.]
