Writer Confession time – I hate coming up with titles. Whether it’s a short story or a full length manuscript, when it comes time to sum the themes up with an appropriate title I will agonize for days. When I do settle on one, I often regret the choice after the fact – it’s too wordy, too trite, trying too hard to be clever. I hear there are people who have the title appear in flashing lights and trumpet blasts, something so perfect that they never consider calling their story anything else. Needless to say, I am not those people.
The trick, for me, is coming up with something short enough to be memorable, but not so commonplace as to be forgettable. Sometimes it works. “Loss for Words” in Apex’s Dark Faith anthology is a double play on the meaning of the phrase, describing both the main character’s affliction and, ultimately, his cure. Other times, I’m less thrilled with the title – “Code Duello,” the rules of dueling, is a reasonable title for the story, but I often wish I would have gone with something that caught the spirit of intrigue and entrapment a little better.
So there it is – with rare exceptions, the title is the last thing I write. When I talk about my works in progress with my first-readers, I refer to them by thematic elements. “The one with the shifters” or “The space opera one” or even “The new one.” I’d love to hear that I’m not the only one with this terrible affliction, but until I check for comments, I’ll have to spend my time working on “that Steampunk one.”
jch
