You have just spent months working on your novel. The characters are in place, their stories are told. But now you are faced with a huge challenge of finding the right title for your book. Now what?
When it comes to titles for your book, the first thing I have to say is to not be wedded to it. The odds are the title will change once the publisher gets his or her hands on it. You have to remember, the publishers have marketing teams who have spent hours researching what works and what doesn't work with titles. They know which words will draw in readers attention and which words will scare them away.
This should not come as a shock to you. Think about how you pick your books to read. I am not talking about those books from your favorite authors, or those recommended to you by your friends or those bots that have been tracking your online purchases. I am talking about the times when you are randomly looking at books. The odds are you are first drawn in by two things - A) the cover art; and B) the title. These are essentially magnets to draw you in.
When you think about titles for your own books, think the same thing. You want to find something that would draw in the reader and make them think this is something they want to read. It needs to be simple, and to the point. Focus in on the theme of the book, or a major event in the book. You might even find a title from some line one of the characters speaks in the novel.
As an agent, I can honestly say, out of all the submissions I have read, only one made me so interested I had to read the book simply based on the title. This was one of my first acquisitions and the title said it all "SEX AND THE SINGLE GHOST". That title stuck too!
Thanks for answering my question! I appreciate you doing so and your thoughts were very helpful. One angle I had not thought of was what the cover art might look like if my story became a published book. I immediately began to picture a finished book and a whole new list of title possibilities popped into my head.
ReplyDeleteI do understand that any title I might choose could be changed. But I am now feeling much more satisfied with my title inventions, and that is progress.
Kate M.