Hybrid Genre: Dark Fantasy/Parody-Satire

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Starchaser3000

Science fiction fantasy
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Just recently self published a dark fantasy/parody
Could anyone recommend me to books and authors that might be remotely associated in this type of genre? I know a lot about world literature stuff, but outside of the Game of Thrones author, I'm clueless on the modern fiction/fantasy genre as a whole. So can someone help a newb like me with references to authors that might fit under this hybrid genre? Or better yet, reference to me unknown authors that in your opinion are different, unique, odd, avant garde, or intriguing?
 
Um.
Are you asking for a parody or satire of dark fantasy?

Could you perhaps expand a fraction on what you call dark fantasy. I was under the impression that some people use it to describe fantasy where everyone has a really hard time, or is a bit gothic, or maybe has bondage type sex and others use it for vampire (which can also have bondage type sex.....).
Could be wrong there.
 
To tell you the truth my friend, I'm not really sure. I consider my book parody/satire, but someone told me that I have Dark Fantasy elements as well. Such as human sacrifice rituals, submissive/bondage sexual situations, demons and magically altered beasts committing vicious acts of violence..ect, ect, ect. Do you believe that this would be considered elements of Dark Fantasy? And would you know other authors doing anything similar to what I'm doing right now?
 
There's not a lot of humorous fantasy around, period - there isn't a big market for it, apparently. If you want satirical fantasy, your man is Terry Pratchett - he's huge here in the UK, but is gaining a following in the US at last. If you like dark fantasy, I would recommend starting with "Nightwatch", which is probably the darkest of his books.
 
Yeah..I have already heard of that guy. Maybe I could be like the USA version of him, haha!! Seriously though, I'm glad there is not that much of a market for it. Which is a core reason why I decided to do this. But I have more ideas for "serious" fiction in the future. By then, I will have a better understanding of the publishing industry on what sells and what doesn't. This is just the more "avant garde" phase of my writing. Commercial success is probably not an option for me in this lifetime.
 
Yeah, I think that the sort of stuff you're talking about could be a very hard sell! Serious fiction is much easier to find a home for.

Pratchett didn't really become huge until he started satirising well-known stories like fairy tales and Shakespeare. The market for parodies of an already limited genre is...well, I'm sure you can draw the Venn diagram!
 
So true. Since when I ask people to give me those types of authors or books as new releases, I get nothing except Pratchett and a few others. But nobody new at all. In looking at the cup half full philosophy, I just think that gives me a good chance to corner the market for myself. Even if I never achieve commercial success, I believe my 4 volume series would be better appreciated in the future, long after I died in obscurity, where I will hopefully be considered a pioneer by then. Hehe So I'm OK with not fitting in this modern era of the fiction industry anyway. It has been my master plan all along.
 
Humorous/parody fantasy? There's Esther Friesner, Piers Anthony, Robert Asprin (myth), Tom Holt, Craig Shaw Gardner, Margaret Ball… quite a lot of people like Robert Rankin, most of whose oeuvre falls more or less into these categories.
It's not an enormous subgenre, and the books tend to be of the "read it once and leave it on a bus" standard unlike the aforementioned Pratchett series, but they are frequently seen on railway and aeroport "grab something at the last minute which doesn't require huge concentration" shelves, and occasionally supermarkets.
 
chrispenycate said:
Humorous/parody fantasy? There's Esther Friesner, Piers Anthony, Robert Asprin (myth), Tom Holt, Craig Shaw Gardner, Margaret Ball… quite a lot of people like Robert Rankin, most of whose oeuvre falls more or less into these categories.
It's not an enormous subgenre, and the books tend to be of the "read it once and leave it on a bus" standard unlike the aforementioned Pratchett series, but they are frequently seen on railway and aeroport "grab something at the last minute which doesn't require huge concentration" shelves, and occasionally supermarkets.
Click to expand...

Thank you for all those references friend.
 
This is exactly what you're looking for:

400000000000000090891_s4.jpg


And it's absolutely vile. One of the worst things I've ever attempted to read. I gave up after -






SPOILER -NSFW discription below (we really should have spoiler tags on this site.)




a girl masturbates with a unicorn horn
 
D_Davis said:
Heh... :)

I love the premise, but didn't like the execution.
Click to expand...

That's why this kind of book is so hard to get published - sense of humour is so personal, which means you have to hit exactly the right agent at the right time. With non-humorous books, you have a bit more leeway of the "this isn't perfect but I known an editor who loves this kind of thing" variety.
 
Anne Lyle recommended Pratchett's Nightwatch. I would say start earlier than that in the Ankh-Morpork city guards thread (Pratchett follows different sets of characters and locations in the Discworld - the witches in the Ramtop Mountains, Death, Rincewind the wizard from Ankh-Morpork and a few one offs).

The city guards and Samuel Vimes are the darkest thread - deals with the nature of politics and war in several of the books. For my part I'd start at the beginning of that thread to get the most out of Nightwatch. So Guards, Guards; Men at Arms; Feet of Clay and so on. (See fantastic fiction website if you've not already found it. Useful tool.)

And another dark fantasy parody - Mary Gentle's Grunts. It is eye wateringly funny and also nasty. It follows the grunts of the army of dark - the Orcs.
 
P.S. - when/if you do find books like yours, look at the publication date. I am under the impression that when Terry Pratchett first became popular there were various people tried out by publishers trying to find "the next Pratchett" but none of it took and it hasn't been tried in a while.
 
It's not a parody/satire of fantasy, but it's dark in places. CS Lewis' Pilgrim's Regress might come under your heading. It's a satire of the various philosophies of the time.
 
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