I came about a series of videos of a class Brandon Sanderson had been teaching two years ago on youtube. In which he has a great way of summing up the common genres of Science Fiction and Fantasy:
- Epic Fantasy: World’s at stake.
- Heroic Fantasy: Dudes with swords.
- Urban Fantasy: Chicks in leather kill demons.
- Military Sci-Fi: Space Marines! YEAAAH!!!
- Space Opera: Adventure in SPACE.
- Hard SF: Written by people with PhDs.