Earlier this year I saw a baby deer in the park near my home and I was filled with wonder and joy!

And today they mowed the meadow in that same park and I saw bones and tanned leather and I was filled with despair!

And then I realized that this was a story.

But what genre?

If the dead baby deer led me to an epiphany about my failing marriage and that hot coed in my seminar on American Literature and I decided that society’s rules killed the human experience and also I was a man, that’s literary.

If the dead baby deer were just a figment of my imagination, a warning about the competitor in my life trying to steal my career, that’s a psychological thriller.

If the dead baby deer was a way to lead me to greater understanding about my connection to God and his son Jesus Christ, that’s inspirational fiction.

If the dead baby deer was killed by an unknown horror in the nearby woods and it was the last warning I had before my friends and family went missing, that’s horror.

If I decided to find out why the baby deer died and discover it was murdered, that’s a mystery.

If it was killed because it saw a mob hit, that’s a crime thriller.

If it was killed as part of a local government conspiracy, that’s a political thriller.

If the dead baby deer (yeah, I know that’s technically a fawn) we’re actually an alien and a casualty in an intergalactic war, that’s sci-fi.

If it was a princess who managed to break a curse and the skin and bones was left behind, that’s fantasy.

If the dead baby deer were a Jedi and I had to accept my destiny because of its death, that’s Star Wars.

If the dead baby deer were an ensign and had been killed as part of an away party, that’s Star Trek.