Hang on a second while I leap out the window to a fiery end on 7th Avenue please!
Ok, ok, you're right, I'd probably just bounce off all the pedestrians staring at the great round orb that has recently returned to the NYC skies.
Back to the reason for my window ledge excursion:
Titles!
Book titles!
I have several books almost ready to go out on submission and all of them need new titles. I'm staring into space muttering things to myself such that the Sharkly Assist gives me her trademarked raised eyebrows and not-so-furtively reaches for the butterfly net:
Good titles aren't make or break items but a good title --the RIGHT title-- sure doesn't hurt. Thus my mutterings and grumblings.
I like to pick a phrase from the book, and when I read a novel I make a list of some of the words I think might work.
And then there are the times when the author has an idea and I have an idea and together we have:
And then there are the times we have a title and one of us decides it should be something else. #oops. It's not a good idea to change a title mid-submission so the new title has to be amazingly better than the old one. And even then I don't like to do it (it drives editors bonkers and makes it harder to track email conversations and submission records). I want to come up with the right title BEFORE I go out on submission.
So, when you need a title, what do you do? I'm not above stealing your tricks of the trade for my own nefarious purposes.
