by Sheree Crawford

Urban fantasy is very much the rising star of the Young Adult genre; Cassandra Clare, in particular, has made a name for herself in this genre. Of course, it’s not just for teenagers… you’ve probably read an urban fantasy novel already, without knowing it!

Joanna Penn, herself an Urban Fantasy author, defines it as “magic and weird stuff creeping in at the edges of a world in which magic is not the norm” (source). To deconstruct this a little; urban fantasy is predominantly about man-made worlds in which creatures and conventions found in high fantasy have a presence of some kind. It’s generally subversive of the tropes found in high fantasy, and it’s generally early modern to modern in time period, as opposed to the medieval-esque scenes and settings of traditional fantasy.