Ways to Live Forever? That's a fantastic title. Very intriguing & I suppose that's what a title's got to do - make the reader want to read on.

Yes, I agree about the title giving the novel a shape in the writer's head. I feel as if I've been formally introduced to mine now & can nod at it if we pass in the street.

Thanks! It had some god-awful titles along the way. It was called The Book of the Caterpillar for a while, which everyone said made it sound like a picture book or a natural history textbook ...

The title for mine didn't come until it was about two-thirds done. Up until then, I'd simply named it after one of the characters, Clinton Zanzibar the Third, foreshortened to CZ3. That was what I named my filenames and backups (and continue to do so while it is in second draft) During the course of plotting, I had to invent a codicil from a dead lord which became the pivotal part of the story, from which everything else forked and came back to. As soon as I wrote the words, 'The Stoneybrook Covenant' I knew I had my title.

That said it (and as mentioned elsewhere in this thread) it'll probably get changed when (if!) it ever goes to print.

The Book of the Caterpillar is quite a cool name in a way, but, yes, perhaps a little too reminiscent of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, which is a fantastic children's picture book.

I was set on 'Stretching the Elastic' for my first (unpublished) masterpiece-thought it fitted in really well with the themes etc- until several people pointed out it sounded like knicker elastic! It's now 'Evie'

Stretching the Elastic definitely does make me think of knicker elastic, yes (it's reassuring that I'm not the only one...) & I have to admit I'd probably pick it out from the shelves and have a look purely on the basis of that...

Can see why you might want to change it though.

It's true that it's hard to resist pressure from your publishers to change the title, but it is your absolute right to do so if you need to. Unlike the cover design, where you don't have right of veto, with the title you do.

Having said that, sometimes they're right. It took me three months to agree that my editor was right about TMOL's, though it was one of my suggestions.

Emma

A horrible task. I've pondered for ages with my short stories. I've even tried using phrases out of songs to see how they work. My novel, which is to be published in a few weeks, started out as one thing, but when I searched Amazon, I found someone else had beaten me to it. I then thought of a single word title which was okay, until I saw it had also been used.... Aghhhh! I ended up using a thesaurus on the word I liked, and came up with, WITHOUT REPROACH. I liked it, and it stuck. But I absolutely hate thinking up titles. I always think they sound naff.

Anthony

My agent wants me to think of a new title for Tash and Kev. It was only ever a working title, anyway, I suppose.

But she wants something obviously very commercial sounding, something like off the cover of a gossip magazine, like Heat.

The thing is, I hate those bloody headlines you get on magazine covers where the actual article doesn't really deliver what it promises.

What do people think of the idea of 'selling out' on the title, if you don't on the content???

I'm going to have to think of something we both can agree on, I guess.

Cath

Sometimes titles just do arrive. I feel as if titles for my short fiction have been easy, but then they were mostly all written purely for my own fun. Even with the two I've had commissioned, it wasn't the title that was selling the publication as it were - one was in a mag, one will be in an anthology. Maybe it's the fact that it's by the title (like the cover) that a novel lives or dies, commercially speaking, that makes it all so fraught for all concerned.

Emma

<Added>

Cath, working titles do stick, don't they! You could brainstorm a list of possibles that you could bear, and let her pick.

I had to change my title, but I really loved the one the editor came up with, so I didn't mind at all. I'm quite happy to sell out on the title - I see it as like the cover, more for marketing than anything. There are plenty of books that I've picked up because they've got a great title, read them, enjoyed them, and only weeks or months later noticed that the title seems to have nothing to do with the content at all.

I've now got two working titles for novel-in-progress:

After the Crash

or

Point of No Return

Basic plot theme: a young man's involvement in a car crash in which a man appears to have been killed highlights the weaknesses in the relationships in his life and causes them to unravel. I.e. an event after which life is never the same again.

Any thoughts about which title sounds better / more arresting?

Well, first impressions: After The Crash sounds like a non-fiction book on the Wall Street Crash, so I guess of the two I'd have to go with the second one.


- NaomiM

I hadn't thought of that, but I see what you mean. Maybe the second one then. Or something completely different.

There's a title just popped up on The Random Read = Corporal Punishment which I've just miss read as Corporeal Punishment and wondered if it was a story about drug addicts shooting up in dark corners.