How to Title a Novel: Breaking It Down

So I'm there. At that critical place. Deciding on a title for the novel I've been working on since 2006.

Exciting?

Yep.

Challenging?

Yep.

Overwhelming?

A little.

Why?

Well, besides the fact that I'm a little nutty/obsessive/neurotic about all writing-related stuff, I'm determined to come up with a title that speaks for this story. After all, I've spent nearly four years writing it--lived it, breathed it, dreamed it, worked it, rolled it under the bed when I was sick and tired of it, nursed it, cuddled it, thrashed it, once bashed it over the head with a boot, hid it from myself in a box, loved it, hated it, loved it again.

Needless to say, this book needs the right title.

Of course, there's also all the marketing stuff related to titles. Like the fact that...

• a title is usually the first thing an agent/editor/bookstore owner/book buyer hears; it is often what begins a person's relationship with a book
• a kick-ass title can help you sell books, get reviews, get noticed, get buzzed on social media networks, etc.
• a kick-ass title can stop a browsing book shopper in her tracks; get her to pick up your book and buy it
• a kick-ass title can be passed from reader to reader on a subway or in a Tweet. "Hey, have you read _______? Oh, my god, you should."
• a kick-ass title stays with a reader long after the reading is done

All true.

But most important for me--the writer, right now--is to come up with a title that FEELS right.

With that said, I have 3 working titles:

1. one rather looonnnnggg title (15 words)
2. one very short title (1 4-letter word...no, no, no...not a 4-LETTER word like f*ck or h*ll or sh*t...a much more powerful 4-letter word)
3. one in-between title (3 words, 3 words)

Now I've got to decide which works best and feels right (or...if I should scrap 'em all and start from scratch). (And no, I can't tell you what they are...sorry. Wish I could.)

To help me in this task, I decided to dig into titles and titling a bit more. With a little help from my pals on Twitter and Facebook, here's what I've come up with thus far. The breakdown:

Long(ish) Titles:

• A Heartbreaking Work of a Staggering Genius (Dave Eggers: memoir)
• From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (E.L. Konigsburg)
• Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life (Amy Krouse Rosenthal:memoir)
• The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Sherman Alexie)
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Mark Haddon)

1-Word Titles:

• Beloved (Toni Morrison)
• Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides)
• March (Geraldine Brooks)
• Choke (Chuck Paluhniak)
• Thirsty (Me...)
• Tethered (Amy McKinnon)
• Tinkers (Paul Harding)

During my Twitter poll, @StacyBierlein mentioned that she likes titles that are complete sentences. Though I hadn't thought about titles in this way, I realized that I, too, like complete-sentence titles. There are some really great ones out there:

• Who Will Run the Frog Hospital? (Lorrie Moore)
• I Love Myself When I Am Laughing and Then Again When I Am Feeling Mean and Impressive (Zora Neale Hurston: nonfiction)
• You Shall Know Our Velocity (Dave Eggers)
• Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret (Judy Blume)

But I'm pretty sure the most common type of title for a novel is the "phrase title," which can be broken down into categories.

Titles that describe an object:

• A Spot of Bother (Mark Haddon)
• The Lizard Cage (Karen Connelly)
• The Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers (Xiaolu Guo)
• The Sea (John Banville)

Titles that describe a person(s):

• The Girl With Glass Feet (Ali Shaw)
• The Murderer's Daughters (Randy Susan Meyer)
• The Time Traveler's Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
• The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson)
• Tinkers (Paul Harding)

Titles that describe an action:

• Ursula, Under (Ingrid  Hill)
• Loving Frank (Nancy Horan)
• Eat, Pray, Love (Elizabeth Gilbert: memoir)

Titles that describe a feeling (most often, love):

• The Opposite of Love (Julie Buxbaum)
• Love and Other Impossible Pursuits (Ayelet Waldman)
• Love You Hate You Miss You (Elizabeth Scott)
• Love in the Time of Cholera (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)

Titles that pinpoint a place:

• Brooklyn (Colm Toibin)
• Island Under the Sea (Isabel Allende)
• Red Hook Road (Ayelet Waldman)

Titles that play with grammar:

• So Cold the River (Michael Koryta)
• What Is Left the Daughter (Howard Norman)

And one thing I learned via Twitter is that some of the best titles come out of kids' imaginations. Like the one @ErikaRobuck 's 5-year-old son suggested:

• Gooey Stuff in the Closet

I tell you what, if my book had anything at all in a closet--gooey or not--I'd steal this title right away. It rocks!

Of course, titling a book gets a little more complicated when you start thinking about the relationship between the story and its title. Some use the direct approach, like Patrick Gale's Notes from an Exhibition.

And other titles, like Jonathan Safran Foer's Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, have a more imaginative, peripheral relationship...which I like. Which I really like.

So with all that said...

QUESTION FOR YOU: What are your favorite titles of novels? Why do they work?

___

photo credits:

lightbulbs: Pixomar / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

glasses/book: Michelle Meiklejohn / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Comments

[Erika Robuck]

My son is grinning ear to ear. He loved being featured in a writing blog! :)

Seriously, my favorite title ever is Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. The irony. The perfection. Unforgettable!

[Casey Freeland]

I like titles that stretch me out either literally, making me look at the far away, or imaginatively, making me consider what I hadn't before.

I've always loved "The City at the End of Time" by Greg Baer.

I love when a title intimates something you don't find out about right away. "Kushiel's Dart" is an example. Jacqueline Carey set up mystery with those two words. A Plague of Angels by Sheri Tepper is another example.

I guess I'm a thing title lover. Matches my own novel, Dalia's Fire. A a couple of titles of WIP's.

[Kristin Bair O'Keeffe]

Hey Erika...happy to have been able to include your son's title. Think he hit on something key when it comes to titling a book.

Thanks for bringing up "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance." It is such a perfect title.

[Kristin Bair O'Keeffe]

Casey...ah, the nuance of the "thing title"...something you don't find out about right away. Good point.

[Cheryl]

Sometimes I just like titles that make me think or ask a question. "The Golden Mean" by Annabel Lyon, for example.

[TheGirlPie]

Great titles are, to me, titles that "speak to an expectation."

That expectation may be a time, an understanding, a coupling, an event... but it incites curiosity even as it promises an action, and more importantly: a consequence.

Expectations compel humans.

WHEN YOU REACH ME, a haunting novel by Rebecca Stead, is a prime example.

The very best of the titles that "speak to an expectation" do double duty, as Ms. Stead's does, by seeming to be clear about the 'top note' of the work, but by the end of the read, actually describes the 'bass notes' of the story...
Notes of that essential perfume of a great tale, the 'theme.' Delivering that "got what she didn't know she needed more than she got what she wanted" realization --
resulting in that maturation of a title that rewards a Reader with a deeper meaning, in thanks for them staying until the very end.

But then, a great title never really ends, does it?

After the book is read (for the first or umpteenth time), the great title lives on to headline our memory of "that time in my life when I was in that book."
The great title lives on to be a gift told to a friend;
to be a rich mind-movie each time it's heard in context; and lives on to be an emotional jolt when it's overheard in happenstance, out of context.

Write a great title.
Keep us compelled to the last page and rewarded for the journey.
Inspire a great editor to reread the ms to plant or nurture your scented notions to further bloom and ripen the personal perfume of the newly-titled work...

Make us remember your great title years later as a new standard, even tearing up even as we wax overlong and over-longingly in some kind lady's comments...

Write on,

~ @TheGirlPie