Let’s all be punks!

I've been toying with where to pigeonhole The Yak Guy Project when I finally finish it. It occurred to me there are a whole bunch of new categories that I might explore.

It all started with cyberpunk. It soon branched out into some of these other genres:

• Steampunk
• Dieselpunk
• Biopunk
• Clockpunk
• Splatterpunk
• Elfpunk
• Magepunk
• Wizardpunk
• Atompunk

It seems to me the common denominator is punk. A big part of this is because everyone likes to make up new words. It's like a word for a celebrity couple, like Benifer or Kimye. In other words, it doesn't mean squat. Oh, and it also all seems to involve one of the speculative genres.

 

Let's pretend there is something to all this for a moment. These things involve alternate realities. Heck, I could get into that. I write stuff like that. They generally involve whatever fictional world being under complete control of the first half of the term. Steampunk = Steam, get it.

 

The punk part usually means that some fringe person or group doesn't agree with the status quo. They go on to face the villain using their mastery of the same technology everyone else has.

 

All in all it isn't a bad way of telling a story. I just don't love the terms. They tell me something about the era, and give me an idea of what to expect though. Dieselpunk means I expect a specific era in time, say from WWI to about the birth of the atomic age, after that it's atompunk.

 

Maybe my novel will spawn a whole new genre, yakpunk. In fact, I can see a whole bunch of new genres in my future, providing they don't already exist:

 

Monsterpunk – Frankenstein, darn.

Robotpunk – I Robot.

Apepunk…nope.

 

Alright, let me try again:

• Flintpunk – a stone age political thriller involving tribes and species.
• Bowpunk – angsty young archers storm the castle.
• Rocketpunk – may already exist.
• Bronzepunk – Are we not entertained?
• Punkpunk – a late 20th century setting with lots of music.
• Circuspunk – crazed clowns are overthrown by freaks riding circus elephants.
• Crudepunk – the oil industry battles the EPA over leases and nature preserves.
• Ritalinpunk – just, no.
• NASCARpunk – self explanatory.
• Junkpunk – everyone lives in a junkyard and government scavengers are taking all the best junk.
• Spelunkpunk – everyone lives in caves, and access to daylight is denied. Thank god for some wild eyed youths.
• Cowpunk – westerns with oppressive controls in place.
• Romancepunk – despite an oppressive regime, love conquers all.
• Heropunk – everyone is a hero. A group of outcast youths become villains to balance the scales.
• 50shadespunk – everyone is a sex weirdo, but a group of friendship ring wearing virgins stand up for their rights.

Okay, enough. What do you think about genres? What about genres that are too specific? Do you think fantasy, science fiction, paranormal, and even horror are enough?

• Authorpunk – in a world where everyone is an author (Somebody help me. Send beer.)
• Artillerypunk – (I'm not kidding, send beer.)
• Siliconebarbiepunk – (Maybe something stronger)