The Most Profitable Fiction Genres: What Aspiring Authors Should Know

Several years ago, I studied creative writing at UCLA.

I will never forget my professor stating that if we (students) wanted to make any money in fiction, we should write romance.

She rattled off some wild statistics about the popularity of the genre, and I decided I should read a romance novel to see what all the fuss was about. So, I went to the library and checked out a few books.

In no time, I was hooked on mystery romances, which I still read. I’m also a big fan of cozy mystery, a sub-genre of mystery.

And the thing is, I’m not the only one.

The Stats

I don’t remember all the aforementioned stats my professor told us, but according to WorldMetrics.Org, romance is still the number one genre in terms of books sold.

From their 2024 report of fiction book sales in the USA:

• Romance is 23% of all fiction sold
• Mystery and thriller combined are 19%
• Science fiction and fantasy combined are 15%

If you want to write fiction and make some money from your writing, your best bet is to choose one of these genres, because it is clear there is an audience.

So far, I’ve self-published (under a pen name) seven fiction books on Amazon, and I’m working on my eighth.

I’ve got a system that works well to produce these books, and I’m learning how to market better with each release so my sales and Kindle page reads continue to increase.

Eventually I plan to write in a second genre, under a second pen name.

I’ll be writing about my process and progress here and on Medium, to help other independent authors finally write and publish their books.

Follow along if you dream of writing and publishing a fiction novel.