Another frequent book club question is, “How do you come up with your titles?”

My answer reflects the experience of many authors: “Erratically” (or “Poorly” when I’m at my most self-deprecating).

Sometimes a title is the first thing that occurs to me and suggests the theme or an entire plot, as in the case of The Caretaker and Aftermath. These titles appeared at the top of the first draft, survived every revision, and ended up on the cover. The Caretaker is a double entendre in that it describes both the protagonist, Sarah Gordon, and her husband, who is taking care of Sarah. She is taking his care instead of becoming independent again; her struggle is conveyed by the title. Unfortunately, the term “caretaker” has been supplanted by “caregiver,” so I’m not sure my title really works anymore.

Aftermath is all about Janet Wright fighting her way through the small-town web of lies, secrets, and scandals she uncovers following her father’s murder. A short, punchy, perfect title, right? While I love the tension conveyed in the smoldering-wreckage imagery of the term “aftermath,” there are nearly 100 books with that word in their titles, including a best-selling Star Wars novel, which makes it difficult to find mine in an online search: thus, not the best choice.

Another punchy one-word title I liked didn’t make it into print because it was shot down by the publisher. Hardscrabble Road was originally called Provenance because of Bud’s obsession with his origins. As my first publisher pointed out, however, many people don’t know what that word means, they can’t spell it, and/or they could confuse it with Provence and think the book was set in the South of France instead of South Georgia. At least the publisher didn’t insist on a title of their own invention, as often happens in this industry. Charged with renaming the book, I eventually came up with Hardscrabble Road to describe the physical location but also convey a metaphor for Bud’s difficult journey through childhood. Readers seem to understand this double-meaning from the get-go and love the name. I’ve learned to love it, too.

Other times, I struggle with the title, and change it with nearly every draft. The Five Destinies of Carlos Moreno was the eighth or ninth name for the first novel I wrote. As the plot and themes evolved, the working title kept changing but nothing really fit. I settled for something literary-sounding, with the protagonist’s name included. I’d written this before The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao came out, but that and many other books reflect the same long tradition I tapped into. I still like its lyricism, but I think it’s the hardest of my titles for readers to recall accurately, and people tend to shorten it to Five Destinies or simply Carlos Moreno. If you’re keeping score, that’s one out of four titles that have succeeded on all levels.

Which brings me to my new suspense novel, due out in October 2019.

The story is about popular web-radio interviewer Bo Riccardi, the lengths this wife and mother will go to save her family, and her redemption through rediscovered faith in herself as well as a Higher Power. In the opening chapters, Bo’s husband, Oscar, is abducted. The man holding Oscar demands to be interviewed live on-air. Refusal will mean Oscar’s brutal death, but acceptance propels Bo toward madness and despair. An aspect that makes this something other than a female version of Taken is that Bo has synesthesia, a blending of senses that affects about one-percent of the population. In her case, it’s a special form of color-hearing synesthesia (“chromesthesia”) that enables her to literally see the speaker’s intent in his words. She will need much more than this gift, though, to help her save Oscar and exorcise the guilt that binds her to the kidnapper.

Given the “chromesthesia” hook, I played with titles that evoked the shapes and colors Bo sees as people talk, finally settling on The Color of Lies, which one of my critique group colleagues suggested. I tried it out with various people and they seemed to find it intriguing. Also, the inclusion of Lies in book titles has enjoyed a long, profitable run (as has Girl, which could be a whole ‘nother blogpost). My new publisher liked the title, too, and we even used it on some promotional pieces to booksellers last year to prep them for October 2019.

And then a bestselling author published a book in November 2018 with not only the same title but a chromesthetic protagonist. No, she didn’t steal my manuscript; hers is a relationship novel for young adults. However, it’s a good reminder that there are only so many words out there that can be linked to form compelling titles and only so many plot and character ideas. Sometimes, I think there’s a river of creativity independent of ourselves from which all artists dip, and occasionally two or more of us come up with the same or similar notions.

Given the aftermath of Aftermath—lots of people asking me if I wrote a Star Wars novel under a pen name or complaining that they couldn’t find my book while searching online—I learned my lesson about choosing a title identical to a bestselling author’s work. And then there was the whole uproar late in 2018 with Nora Roberts being erroneously accused of title plagiarism by a different young adult novelist.

So, I had to come up with something else.

Many authors and publishers like short, punchy titles—one or two memorable words—while others go for generic ones of varying lengths (e.g., as much as I enjoy Lee Child’s two dozen Jack Reacher novels, I can only correctly name a couple of them). Alliteration is a popular means of helping a title resonate with readers. Another consideration: as with many writers, I like having my title appear in the text either as a direct quote or very close to it, to reinforce the “brand” of the book. Unfortunately, I’d gotten so stuck on my working title, everything I came up with was a version of it: The ___ of ___.

It wasn’t until I was going through the second round of edits with my publisher that a new title popped into my mind, fully formed: Watch What You Say. Alliterative, not too long, ominous and vaguely threatening as befits a suspense novel, and—my favorite thing—a double-meaning, because not only is it a caution but Bo can literally watch what anyone says.

The folks at SFK Press seem to like it. Random test-marketing as I talk to people has yielded positive feedback. But will Watch What You Say succeed as a memorable title? That’s up to my readers. All I can do is give them the best book I can write and breathe a relieved sigh because this baby finally, officially has a name.

 

BONUS:

I’m not the only author with a spotty track record for naming books. Here are two fun articles (with some overlap) about famous authors’ original titles of now-classic works:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/classic-books-original-titles_n_3311784

http://mentalfloss.com/article/26044/what-10-classic-books-were-almost-called