Mashup (book)

A mash-up novel (also called "mashup" or "mashed-up novel"), is a work of fiction which combines a pre-existing literature text, often a classic work of fiction, with another genre, such as horror genre into a single narrative. Marjorie Kehe of the Christian Science Monitor renders this admixture of classic text as "somewhere between 60 and 85 percent original text, with new plot twists added by contemporary co-authors". These "twists" often include horror fiction elements like vampires, werewolves or zombies.

The term mashup or mash-up originated within the music industry. Also called "mash-up", songs within the genre are described as a song or composition created by blending two or more pre-recorded songs, usually by overlaying the vocal track of one song seamlessly over the instrumental track of another. To the extent that such works are "transformative" of original content, they may find protection from copyright claims under the "fair use" doctrine of copyright law. Adam Cohen of the New York Times notes that even before that, "the idea of combining two data sources into a new product began in the tech world" before spreading to other media, including book publishing.

The term appears to have first been coined in a review of Seth Grahame-Smith's 2009 novel, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Initially calling it a 'parody' and 'literary hybrid', Caroline Kellogg, lead blogger for Jacket Copy, The LA Times' book blog, later describes the work as "novel-as-mashup". As the popularity of the novel grew and a bidding war commenced over the film rights to the book, the term spread. Subsequent mash-up novels include Sense and Sensibility and Seamonsters, "Little Women and Werewolves" and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter (also by Grahame-Smith), the last of which was adapted into a film of the same name.

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