Magical Realism? (Does it have unicorns?)

There is apparently a category of literary fiction called "Magical Realism". Magical Realism introduces a sort of magic to the plot to either kickstart it or frame the conflict, but roots the rest of it's setting in the real world.

I find that incredibly fascinating.

Never before had I come across a name for literature like that. I had assumed that all literary fiction needed to be real world problems with real world events (that I find either dreadfully boring or so out of my experience that it's almost alien). Magical realism might be my ticket into writing something that is finally literary.

I'd had a story I'd considered literary once. It was about a little girl who lived in a post-apocalyptic city, but her family was moving and most of the story was set on examining her feelings on the matter and not the history behind the ruins. I tried to send it in to my school literary journal.

They rejected it on grounds of reading 'too genre'.

I was mad, of course, but now I realize it was a step too high on the sliding scale. I can step down, and give Magical Realism a try. Just introduce a magical element (like a lizard burning through someone's boot, or donut halos appearing over the heads of anyone who's had sex behind the donut shop) and never explain it (which is usually a big no-no in fantasy genre) and then just write on my character's conflict spurred on by that event. It seems incredibly simple to me.

....famous last words, huh?