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I was thinking of sometime trying my hand at an urban fantasy, but not like the typical kind. I really don't care for the ones where elves hang out at shopping malls, the man living down the hall from you is a werewolf, there are trolls in the sewers and a dragon in the subway tunnels. I was thinking more along the lines of American take on the Ruritanian Romance: a story set in an imaginary city instead of an imaginary country. The most famous example would be Gotham City in the Batman Mythos. But there are other examples, mostly in comics and movies: Frank Miller's Sin City, the nameless city of the Walter Hill movie "Streets of Fire," the city in the movie "Dick Tracy". I really don't know if there are many examples of what I'm talking about in regular literature. I had been thinking of populating my city with the ethnic descendents of a now-defunct Ruritanian type imaginary European country, but they would all secretly practice a pre-Christian pagan religion with its own pantheon of gods and its own mythology. The idea has been bouncing around in my head for years; I just haven't gotten around to writing it out as a story. 

It looks like an interesting idea. Would the fantasy effect be achieved through religion and eventual appearances of gods or by actual monsters and magical creatures? I like the concept of the imaginary city, and the US is probably more apt than other countries to set that in because of the various cultural immigrations.

It doesn't have much to do with it, but an example of an imaginary cult society set this time in a real pagan city is the short story The Lottery in Babylon by Borges; it's always fascinated me and I don't know why but your post reminded me of it. No real fantasy there though.

The Lottery in Babylon? Not like his Library of Babel story, right? I've read a few translations of Borges. His stuff is pretty interesting. I'll check out the other story, though. Thanks.

mizal, I'm still working on it. Although, I think of that is Fantasy too since it's set in an outdated conception of the solar system.