I think what I’ve been leaning toward with TWOLD, but haven’t formalized, is a sub-genre of:
The first Marloth book alternates between all four categories of fantasy, though the last two parts of the book mostly settle into immersive.
For the second book I have largely leaned toward immersive. The contrast of ordinary and fantastic heightens the fantasy, but at the end of the day, I don’t care that much about that. I’m okay with the fantasy starting to feel ordinary. I have so many goals and ambitions, that contrast is one piece of cargo I’m willing to throw overboard for the sake of other items.
I would still like the story to toy around with there being larger, more alien and frightening dimensions beyond the current one, but that is a nice-to-have and doesn’t need to be a driving force. It’s fine as background, and probably works best that way because its one of those things that if too much weight is placed on it, the end is disappointment.
Mystery loses its wonder once it is solved.
That ties back with what I tried to do in the first book—have lots of mystery that attention is never drawn to. Once plot focuses on a mystery, the audience is dissatisfied if the mystery isn’t solved. But as long as a mystery isn’t focused on and is accompanied by some slight-of-hand, then the target audience can enjoy the splash of mystery without later dissatisfaction.
So in summary, immersive with a splash of intrusive. And a splash of occasional liminal to subvert.
The first part of TWOLD won’t have much survival, but I’d like to ramp that up in the second part, and from there keep it fairly perpetual.
I like how survival horror puts constant pressure on every character in the setting.
It is a great test of ideologies and mettle, bringing things normally hidden to the surface, making it far easier to explore the issues and themes I want to address.
Survival horror helps pull the story together.
The first book was pulled together by Adelle being a MacGuffin. That was kind of accidental and normally I’m not a big fan of MacGuffin plots.