Which term represents the overall category of a written work such as mystery, fantasy, or biography?

• A. Context clues
• B. Inference
• C. Foreshadow
• D. Genre

Answer: (D)

Think about how we categorize different writings. The word that names the broad group a book belongs to is genre. Mystery, fantasy, and biography are all genres, each with typical features you can expect. Knowing the genre helps you anticipate what the text will be like and what kinds of details to notice—for example, mysteries often involve clues and solving a puzzle, fantasies include magical or supernatural elements, and biographies present real-life information about a person. The other terms describe reading strategies or literary devices: context clues help figure out the meaning of unfamiliar words from surrounding text, inference means drawing a conclusion from evidence in the passage, and foreshadow is when the author hints at events to come.