How to Tell the Difference Between Fantasy and Paranormal

When I first started researching genres, the difference between paranormal and fantasy confused me to no end. To me, they were pretty much the same thing. So, I looked around the Interwebs, compared as many different sources as I could, and interviewed all my writer buddies. Here is what I came up with:

Fantasy: Fantasy stories are set on other worlds or in other realities. You can have vampires or werewolves or fairies, but in general, fantasy creatures tend to be more…fantastic and mythological – dragons, gryphons, three-headed dog beasts. Magic is a huge element of fantasy stories. Here is a little test: if you can take away the “weird” in the story (i.e. the beasts, the magic) and the world you are left with is still not the normal, everyday world you know, it’s a fantasy story. Lord of the Rings is a fantasy.

Paranormal: Paranormal stories are set in the real world, the world as we know it…with a little extra thrown in. Vampires, shapeshifters, fairies, elves, witches, demons, gargoyles, ghosts, psychics, mediums, telepaths, time travelers…these all belong in the paranormal world. Use the same test as we used for the fantasy worlds…if you can take away the “weird” factors and you are left with our everyday world = paranormal. For example, if you take away the sparkling, gorgeous vampire, or vengeful ghost, or the time portal the main characters travel through, and you are left with everyday Earth – your story is paranormal fiction. Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files and Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse vampire books are examples of paranormal fiction.

Then I came across Urban Fantasy…a delightful genre that is actually one of my favorite to read and, lately, write…but is probably the biggest pain for me to identify. Because Urban Fantasy is actually fairly similar to Paranormal. In fact, many writers I spoke to use them interchangeably. With UF, you have the fantasy aspects, but they are set in our world like a paranormal…which completely negates the test we used on straight Fantasy and Paranormal.

So, how do you tell if a story is Paranormal or Urban Fantasy? Well, I took a little poll of the writers I know and most of them seem to agree the difference is MAGIC. If the story contains magical elements, it’s an Urban Fantasy. If it doesn’t, it’s Paranormal.

Going by this, stories like Twilight and Vampire Academy would be Paranormal. There are vampires in both and in Twilight especially, some of the vampires have special talents (Edward reading minds, Alice seeing the future) but these talents aren’t really ‘magical.’ Now, the opposite could be argued if you view those elements as magical – in that case, this book could be and has been classified as UF…and this is exactly why this genre is a pain for me :D. But for me, those elements are not magical and I would therefore classify Twilight as a paranormal.

Stories like Wicked Lovely and the House of Night series (Marked, Hunted, etc) would be Urban Fantasy. Because in these books, there are magical elements with the fairy glamour and magic and in the House of Night series, the vampires do some mystical magical stuff with the five elements and their ‘talents.’

Keep in mind, these definitions and tests are what I do and how I differentiate. As with many things in this business, there are few hard and fast rules. I’m sure there are others who do it differently and would disagree with my classifications, but for me, this is what works :)