Yesterday afternoon I reached the sixty-first page of my newest manuscript — and the point at which I was officially sick of calling it by my protagonist’s name. Honestly, where’s the inspiration in Winifred—Book?
Since I’d already written my daily allotment of six hundred of words (716, actually), I decided a new title was the next order of business. After a half hour of puttering I came up with a list of titles, all rejects. Granted, I hadn’t given it a lot of time, but I called in reinforcements anyway. My husband took on the challenge, armed with enthusiasm and a dictionary of international slang. The former was helpful; the latter, not so much.
The story is a middle-grade novel with fairy tale elements, which is why we (very inaccurately) became stuck on the princess theme. Here are a few of the results, some suggested in earnest, some in fits of hilarity, many inspired by that blasted slang dictionary I could not wrest from my husband’s hands:
- Your Basic, Everyday, Standard Princess
- The Princess and the Peace
- Pretty, Pretty Princess
- Pretty, Gritty Princess
- Pretty Ugly Princess
- The Vainglorious Princess
- Proto-Princess
The end result is that I’m no closer to a title, and the word “princess” has begun to sound strained and strange from repetition, but at least I can say I gave it a shot. Titles are usually fun, so I’m sure I’ll come up with something eventually.
Many of you write — books, blogs, etc. How do you come up with your titles? What, in your opinion, makes a good — or bad! — one?
You know, the good thing that a lot of you are saying, and that I’ve heard other places, is that a title is often changed anyway, which means that it only has so much bearing on whether a manuscript is accepted for publication/representation or not. That said, I loved Sarah’s idea of a vote and Melissa’s idea of getting inspiration from other titles. Though, Barrie, you may just be right–I’ll let you know if something come to me now that I’ve started thinking about it. Titles for books always seem to be harder to procure than ones for blog entries, which should not be a shock.
Hi Booklady,
Thanks for stopping by my blog 🙂
Your post is on a topic dear to my heart. I LOVE naming things. Naming something is the process of condensation or distillation that’s a bit like poetry. You have to get right to the heart of the matter in as few words as possible.
I have changed the name of my WIP a couple of times and I’m still not sure what it should be. So, I’m putting it on hold until the book is done. Having said that, I think I just thought of the perfect title. Well, perfect until a more perfect one comes along.
I like the idea of taking a line or a quote from the book. As Alex says above, the title should reflect the theme. Better yet if it’s a metaphor.
Also I love punny stuff, especially for kidlit. Make ’em giggle.
Best,
Tena
i love naming things too!
i love puns too!
i love being ridiculously unhelpful too!
i do think naming something is a kind of personal process so i would be the first to refuse to take the honors away from you!
I read poetry that has the same feel as what I’m writing (or themes, at least) and see if any bits of it stick out or inspire my own turn of phrase. (Or I just read OLD poetry so copyright is no issue.)
I’m bad at titles though.
naming a book is pretty hard. i hope you find the right one.
Hi!
I really aim at feeling my way through. Sometimes titles come with meaning and we don’t realize it until after the fact. If princess is sticking with you for some reason don’t let it go. Play around with the title until you are able to release the cliche or familiar about it. Princess and the Peace was cool and I liked the first one too. As another commenter said, try to distill in a few words what you need to say and then play around with making it pithy, catchy and attracting.
But most of all, don’t stress it will come when you are least thinking of it.
Thanks for the post to my blog and the questions too!
Tena, glad I could help with the title. 😉 I like the idea of thinking of it as a metaphor.
LOL, Aparna! Thanks for your consideration…
Jess, I love that idea! Maybe I’ll have to give that a try. And since it has historical elements, finding older poetry shouldn’t be a problem.
Thanks, no milk. I’m only 61 pages in, so I still have time.
Good point, 77free. I’ll have to think about why the Princess thing keeps standing out. And a lot of ideas seem to crop up when we don’t think about them, don’t they?
I let my CP title my books. She’s WAY better at it than me. I suck at titles.
I’m just not good with titles – but I’m voting for pretty ugly princess! THat one rocks!
Gritty Royalty? Gritty Princess?
I also suck at titles. That is probably why I’m not a writer.