Titles: An Examination

I thought this might be a fun time to discuss the way that titles work in books. Titles are, for the writer, at once extremely important and extremely unimportant. The former because the right title is, like everything else about your submission package, a marketing tool. You want to pick a title that says, “read me,” “buy me” “love me” to the agent or editor. You want it to be hip and sexy and say something profound or cute or funny about your voice and tone and story.

At the same time, titles are pretty unimportant, by which I mean, don’t get your heart set on them, because they almost always change. This is often for those same marketing reasons. What is really sexy and hip and desirable to an acquisitions team may not be the same to the general reading public. For instance, you may turn in a book with a title that is too similar to another book coming out, or another book that is out, or etc., and though it worked really well during the submission process, when there was no other book that could be confused with your book, once you’re looking at something on the marketplace, with thousands of other books around it, it might not have the same panache.

A friend of mine sold a thriller with what I thought was a remarkably goofy title. Her book was sassy and sexy and action-packed, but every time I saw the title, I couldn’t help thinking of a certain bumbling, stuttering comedian. I rejoiced when the title was changed during the editorial process into something that better reflected the story. I can’t picture the book titled anything else. Another writer I know sold a series with a title that is a play on another popular series (think Gary Trotter). She was asked to change the title because the first series’s publisher thinks the two titles are too close.

Publishing houses and their marketing departments know how important a title can be for buy-ins and for simple shelf-appeal. How many of you have picked up a book based on an intriguing title?

Friends who write primarily for category romance lines don’t sweat titles at all. They turn in books with titles like “Contracted romance #2” or “Bill and Jane’s story.” This is because most category romances are retitled anyway to highly branded codewords like cowboy, millionaire, secret baby, mistress, tycoon, prince, Greek, bride, marriage, engagement, etc. (There are some lines (like Harlequin Blaze) which don’t go for those kind of titles, but instead for highly sexualized puns. But most do go for the branding.) This is so readers of category romances know instantly whether a book has their favorite plotline or characters. Some category readers go for the sheik books, or the cowboy books, or hte marriage of convenience books, or the secret baby books. the snappy titles are less important here than they are in single title romance or mainstream, becuase most category readers are very line loyal. They know what their favorite category romance line is and will buy it regardless of title, storyline, or writer. It’s one of the perks of being a newbie in category land. You have the power of the brand behind you.

But for the rest of us, titles are vital. Not so long ago, I changed the title of one of my new projects. I was describing the story to a fellow writer and then started whining about how my agent had suggested a title change. He asked what the original title was; when I told him, he said, “Your story sounds great, but I’d never read a book with that old title.” A writer friend of mine had a tough time getting her agent to even look at her proposal until she gave it a new title. And don’t think editors don’t make decisions like that as well!

Editors think just like everyone else. When you are in a bookstore, examining the masses of new books on offer, your eye will be drawn to titles that intrigue you. You may never have heard of the author or the book, but if the title is interesting, you might pick it up, flip it over and read the back, check out a few pages in the first chapter. The point is to get the book in the reader’s hands. It’s the same thing as having a good cover.

Now imagine you’re an editor. You have a stack of books to read and one train ride home. So you grab one or two. Wouldn’t you be more likely to grab the one which has the really cool title? Yes, you know, academically, that some books are going to be great but have crappy titles, just as the bookstore patron knows that great books often have crappy covers. But you aren’t thinking anything like that when you are on your way home. You’re thinking, “That sounds cool. Let me give it a whirl.”

This post was inspired by a contest I just judged. Most entries had the most lackluster, generic titles imaginable. I judged one entry last because every time I picked it up, that title stared at me fro the first page, and I yawned. I couldn’t help it. But when I finally read it, it was the best entry in the lot, and I gave it a nearly perfect score. It was thrilling, well-executed, suspenseful, poignant, amusing. Good thing I was assigned to read it. What if I’d been an editor who could get away with reading a line or two before rubber stamping it? What if I’d been a reader who never would have picked up the book in the first place?

Don’t you want the first impression of your book to be a good one?

Tomorrow, we’ll talk about the development of the titles for my books.