Category genre comes with specific reader expectations. It doesn't mean other story elements can't be included, of course. A Romance can have a Thriller subplot, or a bit of Horror thrown in, or maybe it's set in an accurately depicted historical setting. But it MUST contain a will-they/won't-they romantic relationship. You can't leave that out. Every 'category' genre books comes with reader expectation of specifically what the story will be 'about.' A Historical Romance will be a romance that takes place in a historical setting. A Crime novel will contain a crime, and will be about somebody's attempt to solve the crime—it can be an amateur, and the reader might be told who the guilty party is at the start, or not. The whodunnit aspect of Crime fiction isn't necessarily why people read Crime. Instead, they may read for the vicarious thrill of watching a crime being committeed, and then following the people who are trying to solve it and bring the criminals to justice. A Mystery is a crime as well, but it's often solved by amateurs, and the reader must try to solve the mystery themselves, before the end of the book. In fact, that's the point of Mystery. It's a puzzle the reader will try to solve. The guilty party is never revealed at the start of a category Mystery. Readers of the Mystery genre would lynch the writer if that happened! A Police Procedural will be about a crime that's solved by the police, using either conventional methods or unconventional ones. Again, the reader might be aware of who the criminal is right at the start. The suspense comes from wondering whether or not the crime will get solved, and if so, how. And etc. Some categories are broader and carry less reader expectation of what the story will be about. Fantasy, for example. That can be 'about' anything, and should remain true to the world the writer creates ...but aspects of the story will not be 'real,' in the sense that can't really happen within the world we actually live in. Readers know this, before they ever start reading a book labeled 'Fantasy.' Just like 'Once upon a time" always meant 'this story isn't really true and couldn't have happened,' so does 'Fantasy' mean the same thing. Science fiction, again, can contain all sorts of themes, characters, locations and situations, but will be about something that 'might' happen, within what we know of the world today. It's usually set in 'our' future and doesn't contain supernatural elements such as magic—although there may be elements the characters do that we can't actually do today. (Speed of light travel, telepathic communication, physical modifications of human bodies or evolution.) Historical fiction is an attempt to recreate a period of history, as accurately as possible. There are certainly crossover elements in many genre books. But try leaving the romantic relationship out of a Romance? Or the crime out of a Crime novel? Or the good guy/bad guy gunfight/showdown out of a Western? You won't be popular.
The Arizona Republic paper is the only major newspaper readily available, but I have never seen them review books. Mainly plays and movies. The local paper is a small community rag, and deals with all the local dealings. They have at a few points mentioned a local author, but no reviews of books. I might have better luck looking in the NY Times, if I want to find more on the subject. Thanks.
One thing I found out in writing one is that my usual method of writing a complete first draft before doing any meaningful editing doesn't work, here. You have to tie up the loose ends, and you have to figure out what else could have happened, how the police might have discovered a key piece of evidence earlier, or just if it all makes sense as you've written it. I did a lot of revising because I realized that certain things just didn't work.
