OpenFiction Isn't Just for Fantasy and Sci-Fi

When people hear "character tracking database," they tend to think of epic fantasy - Sanderson's Cosmere, J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, massive casts of characters with unpronounceable names and complex magic systems. And yes, that's where we started. Fantasy series with dozens of characters across multiple books are the most obvious use case.

But the problem OpenFiction solves - "who is this person and what have they done so far?" - isn't a fantasy problem. It's a reading problem. And it applies to far more genres than you might think.

The case for mystery and crime series

Think about a long-running mystery series. Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch novels span more than twenty books. Characters recur, relationships evolve, backstories are revealed gradually across the series. If you're on book fifteen and a character from book six shows up, you might not remember who they are or what happened between them and Bosch.

Mystery readers are arguably more sensitive to spoilers than fantasy readers - knowing who the killer is before you've read the book is about as bad as it gets

The same applies to the Cormoran Strike series, Inspector Rebus, the Dublin Murder Squad books, or any of the dozens of crime series where the detective's personal life is as important as the cases. These are character-driven stories with continuity that matters.

OpenFiction's spoiler filtering is particularly useful here. Mystery readers are arguably more sensitive to spoilers than fantasy readers - knowing who the killer is before you've read the book is about as bad as it gets.

Literary fiction with recurring characters

Some of the most interesting character tracking challenges come from literary fiction. Anthony Powell's A Dance to the Music of Time follows the same cast across twelve novels and several decades. Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy tracks Thomas Cromwell through a web of Tudor court relationships that shift with every chapter. Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Novels follow two women over sixty years.

These aren't genre fiction with magic systems and world-building appendices. They're literary novels where the character development is the story. Tracking who someone was in book one versus who they've become by book four - their changing beliefs, loyalties, relationships - is exactly what OpenFiction is built for.

Historical fiction

Historical fiction series often have enormous casts blending real and fictional characters. Bernard Cornwell's Saxon Stories, Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin novels, Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond Chronicles - all feature recurring characters across many books, with relationships and allegiances that shift over time. Knowing which historical figures are fictional inventions and which are real, and tracking how the protagonist's world changes across the series, is genuinely useful.

What we already have

OpenFiction already includes content beyond fantasy and sci-fi. Pride and Prejudice and The Great Gatsby are in the database - partly as proof of concept, partly because characters don't need magic powers to be worth tracking. Jane Austen's cast of characters, their relationships and social dynamics, are exactly the kind of structured data that works well in our system.

We've also got The Martian, which straddles the line between sci-fi and thriller, and it's a good example of how even a standalone novel benefits from character tracking when it has a rich cast.

What we'd love to add

Here's a wish list of non-fantasy, non-sci-fi content we think would work brilliantly on OpenFiction:

Mystery/Crime: The Harry Bosch series (Michael Connelly), the Cormoran Strike series (Robert Galbraith), Inspector Rebus (Ian Rankin), the Dublin Murder Squad (Tana French). Long-running series with deep character continuity.

Literary fiction: The Neapolitan Novels (Elena Ferrante), A Dance to the Music of Time (Anthony Powell), the Cazalet Chronicles (Elizabeth Jane Howard). Character-driven sagas that span years or decades.

Historical fiction: The Saxon Stories (Bernard Cornwell), Aubrey-Maturin (Patrick O'Brian), the Lymond Chronicles (Dorothy Dunnett). Vast casts mixing real and fictional characters.

Thriller/Espionage: The Smiley novels (John le Carré), the Jack Reacher series (Lee Child), the Bourne series (Robert Ludlum). Recurring protagonists with evolving personal stories.

If any of these sound like something you'd use, submit a content request. Community votes help us decide what to work on, and the more interest there is in non-genre content, the faster we'll build it.

The data model doesn't care about genre

Under the hood, OpenFiction tracks the same things regardless of genre: where a character appears, what changes about them, who they're connected to, and when all of this happens in the story. Whether that character is a wizard, a detective, or a Tudor courtier, the structure is identical.

The spoiler filtering works the same way too. If you're halfway through the Bosch series, you'll only see information from the books you've finished - just like with Mistborn or The Stormlight Archive.

Genre is a categorisation choice, not an architectural one. If a book has characters worth tracking, it belongs on OpenFiction.