Comedy and Romance. I prefer Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and YA Urban Fantasy. Maybe it's the escapism that comes with these genres, but writing in "real world" settings bores me to tears.
I'm intimidated by hard science fiction. My knowledge of real science is so lacking that I just can't make fictional science plausible enough to not sound like poorly disguised fantasy magic. I also feel awkward writing romance or trying to describe a character as beautiful. When it comes to trying to define a character's beauty, I try to do so from the perspective of another character as a way to cover up my incompetence with objectivity. As for romance, I just tend to avoid it completely which I don't want to continue doing as it's just not realistic. Not every character has to fall in love but eventually I start to feel like the story is being written by a 10 year old boy who still thinks girls are icky and have cooties. I mean, they are and they do but that's not the point. I also have a problem with writing in the first-person. I'm regularly told that it's the "easiest way to write" but it certainly doesn't feel that way. I have trouble separating myself from the character and I either end up writing them as too heroic or boastful or so reserved that they're a total wimp. I can't even adequately describe myself much less describe a character describing themselves.
Personally, I think a helluva story could be told of historical fur trappers, especially taking place in the wilderness of Canada. It seems to me that there would be a lot of potential for character drama; sort of like telling a story set around the California gold rush or something. I once had an idea to tell a story around the rise of modern Egyptology (early 1800s, I believe...) but I'm not so well versed on the subject.
Romance for me because I don't enjoy reading them. I tend to find them predictable so get bored. They are all a bit too "calm" for me. Even movies, I get so bored. I love action or psychological thrillers. At the moment I'm really into big disaster movies like "War of the Worlds" or "Deep Impact". The kind of issues you don't come up against in everyday life because it makes me wonder what would really happen in those situations. What would I do?
Sci-fi or anything science, Historical fiction, Realistic fiction (is there a word for it?), and sometimes Romance. No matter how much research I do on those genres, I just can't put all my effort into them without getting bored and abandoning the stories.
I think I do pretty well with the romance in Romantic Suspense, but plain, generic Romance that hits all the expected tropes, I don't think I could do. Which is too bad, as I have a story idea for what would have to be a light romance. But every time I think about taking it down the familiar path of the genre, I go all twisty inside. It would be so drearily expected and unoriginal.
