The subject is a pet peeve of mine. Andrew Wheeler commented in his blog pretty well on the mixing of romance and fantasy as genres recently. There is an amusing beginning of a paragraph:
Saying that fantasy is still “overwhelmingly dominated by male authors” is true only if you define fantasy very narrowly. Yes, Robert Jordan is the single best-selling recent fantasy writer.
Robert Jordan isn’t even remotely close to being best-selling recent fantasy writer. That title goes to J.K. Rowling. According to Wikipedia, Harry Potter books have sold over 512 million copies.
Is the whole Harry Potter phenomenon moved outside the scope of fantasy? Has it sold too much to be considered fantasy? It seems just so silly that in nearly every discussion about the how fantasy sells, all the talk is about Robert Jordan, Terry Brooks & Goodkind and the kin.
[...] unknown wrote an interesting post today on Nitpick of the week, apparently JK Rowling doesn’t write fantasyHere’s a quick excerptIs the whole Harry Potter phenomenon moved outside the scope of fantasy? Has it sold too much to be considered fantasy? It seems just so silly that in nearly every discussion about the how fantasy sells, all the talk is about Robert … [...]