It's quite hard to explain the difference between a genre author and, well, a normal one, especially if you take the view that there are rather more genres around than serious literary editors would care to admit. But the collaborative aspect is prominent; those sitting in the circle of firelight while the story is told are not passive listeners, but believe they have some rights in the story and that the story itself is a window into another world with a quasi-existence of its own. Kill off a popular character or make one behave against what the reader considers is their nature, and you get Letters from Fans. Genre editors often acquire fans, a word deriving from fanaticus, meaning "of or belonging to the temple," although I'm grateful to the Oxford English Dictionary for adding that it refers to a possessor of "excessive and mistaken enthusiasm." There was also a reference in my Latin dictionary to "orgiastic rites." These have not so far been part of my experience, although some younger fans have occasionally persuaded their mothers to send me a slice of their birthday cake.
(За наводку спасибо
ivha_ua_nsk.) 