The covers are hard to miss in the bookstore -- dark and shadowy in tone, they show a beautiful young woman, usually tattooed and dressed in revealing clothes. She’s armed and the accompanying cover blurb informs the reader that this character is prepared to kick supernatural butt all the way back to hell if necessary. Welcome to the brave new world of urban fantasy.

Once, this corner of the speculative universe had broader boundaries. The term ‘urban fantasy’ encompassed everything from Tanya Huff’s crazed pantheon in Summon the Keeper to the twisted version of London’s Underground in Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, and on to Tim Powers’ Cold War spies in Declare, or the alternate streets Charles DeLint created for his Newford tales. Some great new fantasies with urban settings have come along recently. For example, Elizabeth Bear’s Blood and Iron deals with the intersection of Faerie with the modern world. The Secret History of Moscow, by Ekaterina Sedia, blends Russian folklore and mythology with the gritty reality of post-Soviet life. But more and more these sorts of stories are called ‘contemporary fantasy’ to distinguish them from the publishing juggernaut of urban fantasy.