Did You Catch the Name? by Leah St. James

You know how you hear about a good new book or movie you’d like to check out but you can’t quite remember the name? For me, something like this will run through my head: “I’m looking for the new book by the author who wrote that other book that was about a man and woman...”

You get the picture.

I’m terrible with names, whether I’m trying to remember the names of new acquaintances, or books or movies, or naming my own books. (For some reason, I don’t have a similar problem naming characters, just the books themselves.)

I was thinking about my naming-challenged situation a few months back while reading the list of best-sellers in the Sunday paper, wondering how they all came up with the names.

I’ve never published a nonfiction book, but it seems fairly easy.  You have a specific expertise or point of view you want to share, then you stick on a colon and a bunch of explanatory words after. Here is the list that printed in my paper this past Sunday. Take a look at No. 1:

“Girl, Wash Your Face: Stop Believing the Lies About Who You Are So You Can Become Who You Were Meant To Be” by Rachel Hollis. Okay, so I presume that first phrase has a special meaning to the author, maybe an expression she heard over and over growing up. The rest, after the colon, is all self-explanatory. Easy, right?

Why can’t naming fiction be like that?

Why can’t we title a book something like “Raven: A story about a woman with black hair and how she meets the man of her dreams”?  (Yes, I just came up with that. Catchy, huh? :-) I kind of like the Raven bit though....)

Fiction authors aren’t that lucky. We have to come up with a catchy title that somehow, in some way, conveys what the story is about, without giving too much away. And we have to be somewhat unique. With literally MILLIONS of fiction titles currently published, that’s not always easy.

To me, Margret Mitchell’s classic “Gone With the Wind” is a perfect title, one that – if memory serves me correctly – borrows from a phrase in the book itself.  None of my titles have come that easy, but then I am not a world-famous best-selling author!

Seeking guidance, I took a look at the current list of fiction best-sellers and discovered  something interesting. It seems the trend is to tack a colon after the title, followed by “A Novel.” 

I’ve seen that before, and not just recently, but it seems more and more book titles are following that naming model. Five of this week’s top ten sellers have done it.  Another two have “novel” stuck in the series title, like “Feared: A Rosato & DiNunzio Novel.”

The latter I understand perfectly. You want readers to know the book is part of a specific series. But I don’t understand why you would add “A Novel” to a book title that everyone pretty much knows is a novel.  Do we really need “A Novel” added to Stephen King’s “The Outsider” to know it’s a novel?

 Is it a way to assist with searching? So if I can’t remember the book title (which is probable for me), I pop “A Novel” in the search field and I’ll narrow the field down by 50 percent? (That’s presuming I remember there’s “A Novel” in the title.)

I tested that theory by searching for “A Novel” in Amazon’s book section, but it pulled up every book with the word in the title or description. So that can’t be it.

Next I theorized it’s a device meant to indicate a certain type of novel, a certain intellectual level, maybe literary versus genre fiction. But then I saw the King novel. Stephen King is a brilliant novelist on so many levels, but he doesn’t write literary fiction.

Do those simple words add a mystique? Would “Gone With the Wind: A Novel” have sold more copies? Doubtful.

Whatever the reason, it annoys me. It feels pretentious, like the author is saying, “Hey, look at me. I wrote A NOVEL!” But then I remember the publisher usually rules the title, so the publisher is saying, “Hey, look! He/she wrote A NOVEL!”

None of these thoughts seem to make sense, so I figured I’d toss my question out to this group.

Any idea why so many current book titles seem to include “A Novel”?

Does this annoy anyone else, or is it just me?

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When not frittering away her writing time obsessing over things like book titles, Leah writes stories of mystery and romance, good and evil and the power of love. Learn more about her books (not necessarily the titles) at leahstjames.com, or visit her on Facebook or Pinterest where she occasionally posts about life, writing and her favorite things.

New Title, New Cover by Alison Henderson

I am within hours--or for me, days--of finishing the first draft of my current manuscript. The title and cover have been set for months, or so I thought.

Last Wednesday, while in the shower, I had a horrifying thought. The cover I'd settled on featured a looming figure in the foreground holding a gun in front of what was obviously a college dorm. I chose the image because my hero is a professor, and the setting is a college campus. My heroine is a bodyguard, so it isn't unusual that she would carry a gun. Besides, the image is flirty rather than threatening and matches the images on the first two covers in the series.

However, it suddenly occurred to me that in light of recent events, readers might look at the cover and think "school shooting." That's the last thing I want to suggest! I felt queasy just thinking about it. My books are light, humorous, romantic suspense novels, and I've put way too much into this story to turn anyone off with the cover. 

I remember when the release of the movie "Big Trouble" was postponed for several months after nine-eleven because it made fun of lackluster airport security by having the idiotic villains carry a bomb on a plane by claiming it was a food disposer. Dave Barry's original book was hilarious, and the movie was an excellent adaptation. The problem was timing. People weren't ready to laugh about something like that yet. I certainly don't want my book to suffer a similar fate, especially when I can avoid it. 

This story had also been through a couple of titles, neither of which reflected the story very well, so this was a good opportunity to see if I could come up with something I liked better. I wracked my brain, making myself crazier and crazier, until a writer friend suggested that since my heroine works as a nanny, I might want to try using that word in the title. Bingo! Undercover Nanny was born. It succinctly describes the premise, which is unusual enough to create interest on its own. As usual, I had been overthinking the problem. LOL

From there, it wasn't difficult to come up with a new background image that also matches a couple of scenes in the story. I was able to use the same figure I'd used previously, and I even added the monkey for a humorous touch. After all, he does save the day!

I hope readers will be intrigued, rather than repulsed. Now, all I have to do is finish the darn book.

Alison
www.alisonhenderson.com

How Important is a Title? by Alison Henderson

I don't subscribe to many newsletters, but I am on Joanna Penn's list for The Creative Penn. I've read Joanna's blog for several years--ever since I started toying with the idea of indie publishing--and have always found her advice accessible and useful. She frequently has guest authors, and one of her guests last week, Michael Alvear, wrote a column I found particularly timely. I'll hit the high points, but you can read it for yourself here.

Like me, Michael is a bit of a data geek when in comes to marketing. Unlike me, he has the resources to go above and beyond the norm in his data collection. For his latest book, he actually commissioned a research lab to research lab to conduct an eye tracking study on Amazon's book pages. 

The researchers showed a group of subjects the Amazon book page for a random thriller to which Michael had no connection. They then tracked the eye movements of the test subjects to see which sections of the page caught their attention and where they lingered longest. Some of the results were expected; others surprised me.

As you might expect, the most attention-getting element of the page was the cover. However, the next--by far--was the title. The potential readers spent much more time looking at the title than the blurb. That surprised me. So many books today have generic titles that are not particularly original and say very little about the story, and publishers are at least as guilty of assigning nondescript titles as indie authors, if not more so. 

According to Michael's research and personal experience, uninspiring titles can make a huge difference in sales. He cites one example of author Gerry O'Sullivan's book with the original title of Servants of the Empire. Upon release, it fell flat on its face. When it was re-launched as Gangsters of Shanghai, sales soared, and three months later Sony Television optioned the book! 

This got me thinking about my current manuscript, the third book in the female-bodyguard Phoenix, Ltd. series. Since I first conceived the series, this book has carried the working title Child's Play. To fit with the rest of the series, I needed a short, punchy, two-word title with some reference to the bodyguard's undercover assignment--in this case as a nanny--but I was never in love with it. As I've written more of the story, I've become even less enamored of the title. It suggested something simple, and that doesn't fit my characters or the plot.

However, I still needed a title that fit the established parameters of the series. After reading this article, I put on my thinking cap and came up with something I like much better--Problem Child. Right off the bat, the new title suggests a certain tension, and combined with the cover I think it raises intriguing questions. Who is the problem child? The owner of the legs, who carries a gun? That could be interesting. Or is it someone else? The client's niece? Maybe it refers to the monkey. Inquiring minds want to know!

You might not have the last word on your own titles, but most authors have significant input. I hope this gets you thinking about yours.

Alison
www.alisonhenderson.com 

An Exciting Week...or...Help Wanted! by Jannine Gallant

I Need Help! Probably not a shock to anyone...LOL But this time I need specific help. Book title help. Let me explain what happened...

Last week was an interesting step in my writing career. I had a .99 cent BookBub ad out for Every Step She Takes on Feb. 10th, the second book in my Who's Watching Now series. The third book, Every Vow She Breaks, will be available on March 1st. Last summer, my publisher used the same sales tactic with the first book in the series to promote ESST when it released with really terrific results. But I came up just short of the top 100 overall ranking on Amazon. This time I made it! My lowest ranking was #91 overall and #3 in romantic suspense. Of course the number immediately started a steady upward climb after hitting that milestone, but I felt I'd accomplished something huge. Also, I saw a nice dip in rankings on book one and pre-orders for book three. I hope I can keep the momentum going until EVSB releases on March 1st.

So, I was feeling pretty pleased with myself when I got an email from my editor at Kensington. The uppity-ups wanted a proposal for a new series from me. Was I interested? How soon could I have one ready? Wh...what? My second series with them isn't even finished. The first book in the Born To Be Wilde series, Wilde One, won't release until September. I'm currently 20,000 words into the fourth and final book. Apparently my big ranking milestone caught someone's attention. I can only assume they're banking on the Wilde series doing well to want more books from me. A thought that made me jump up and down a little.

Then reality set in. Here I was, thinking I'd finish Wilde Horses and get to slow down and take a break. Maybe clean my house... Really think about what I wanted to do next. Because I hadn't given my next project a single, solitary thought! I've been too busy writing. The good news was I could do whatever I wanted as long as it was contemporary and a series. Romantic suspense was A-Okay. Terrific! Except I had nothing to guide me in choosing a theme for the new series.

This is where I started pestering my CP, poor Margo, with dozens of emails. I like to call it thinking out loud to someone who will actually answer me, so I don't seem quite as crazy as I would talking to myself. I bounced around ideas. She gave me back a yay or nay and made pertinent suggestions. After getting no writing done for two days, I came up with a series title and rough plots for the first two books. The third is pretty hazy. Here's where the plea for help comes in.

The title for my series is Finders Keepers. The idea is each of the three heroines finds something (but doesn't realize its significance) that the villain of the piece wants back...and will do whatever it takes to get it. Book one is Lost And Found. Book two is Playing For Keeps. Book three is the question mark. I want to use either Find or Keep (or some form of those words) in the title, and I want a common phrase. My plot revolves around my heroine, who searches the countryside for antiques and collectibles for her shop. She finds something related to a crime in a box of junk she bought. Oh, this is a friends to lovers story with a lot of angst getting there. All title suggestions are welcome. Ready, set, go!

If you haven't read Every Step She Takes yet, it's still .99 cents. Buy it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or Apple iBooks.

Thanks in advance for all your help!