Speculative books ask “What if…?”

Most kids learn at least a little about genre in school; they can probably name a few, like mystery, historical, fantasy, and science fiction. I, too, was familiar with the traditional genre labels, until I took a workshop with Joyce Saricks, author of The Readers’ Advisory Guide to Genre Fiction, while I was working at the Robbins Library in Arlington. In her book, and in the workshop, she examined books through the lens of appeal factors, and divided them into the adrenaline genre, the intellect genres, the landscape genres, and the emotion genres.

I no longer have my original notes on the workshop, but I believe it was Joyce Saricks who used the term “speculative” as well, for books that ask “What if…?” Although she classifies fantasy as a landscape genre and science fiction as an intellect genre, both imagine worlds different from ours in some way. This, for me, is a reading sweet spot: not space opera or high fantasy (though I read those too), but a world that’s like ours, but with a twist: there’s time travel, or a coup changes the political landscape, or there’s been a climate catastrophe, or a lethal pandemic, or women are more powerful than men. Or humans have disappeared altogether! They are alternate histories, dystopias, or futuristic stories. These books challenge and stretch readers’ imaginations, encouraging us to place ourselves in that situation and imagine: What if?

Speculation has value as rehearsal; reading is a way to experience something and think through your responses and reactions without having to experience the situation in real life. Here are some of the speculative books I’ve enjoyed over the years. Some are lighthearted, some scary, some a little too close to reality for comfort.

Nonfiction