A Boy Named Sue

You’ve written that blockbuster book, now all you need to do is come up with a title – one that will call attention to your work, be easy to remember, and be appropriate for the subject. You may have already come up with a title even before you wrote your book (a “working title”), try it out once your book is done before you decide to keep it. Even your publisher may suggest a title change if they don’t believe that your title will market very well.

Say the title out loud a few times. How does it feel rolling off of your tongue? Does it start with any “plosive” letter sounds such as B, D, K, P or T? Is it too long, difficult to say or remember?

Try searching the title at online book stores, library catalogues or on the internet. Even if the title sounds wonderful to your ears, if the title is overused, unless you are a big-name author, it will most probably come up very far down the line in a search – once someone has to scroll through more than one page of choices, you’ve probably lost them. If you can vary the title by even a single word to make it stand out, consider it.

If your book is non-fiction, then the title should reflect the subject matter of your book. A study of male friendships, for instance, called Golf Buddies may mislead a potential reader into thinking it is a book about sports. Consider changing the title or adding to it such as Golf Buddies and Other Male Bonding Exercises. (no real titles were intentionally used). Your title should have some sort of hook but there is no need to be cutesy or have a play on words UNLESS IT WORKS.

For fiction works, see if the title fits the subject, no one would expect The Killing Fields to have been a love story. You may want to try out a significant phrase, a character’s name, or the name of a special place. Try it, sound it out, test it on friends.

Would the title cause your book to be shelved in a particular section of a book store or library? Calling a book Job Hunt for non-fiction may be appropriate if it deals with finding employment, but it may be misleading as a fiction title. Adding a word or a phrase might change the impression someone might get from the title, Helen’s Job Hunt, The Hunt, A Job for Helen…

How will your title come up in search engines? As an author you should be posting the book title on your website with its own page what kinds of search terms will find your book title? Keep this in mind when you decide on the audience you mean to reach. You might even try searching your proposed title through Google or another search engine to see what comes up – don’t search it in quotes. One word titles may be very confusing.

Naming a book can be just as serious as naming a baby – that name is going to reflect on it for life. Careful or it might be a name that evokes unwarranted laughter and ridicule, or it might be very intriguing and attract a lot of attention. There is a fun site (I’m not sure how accurate the percentages are) that I enjoy checking titles against, it’s the Lulu Title Scorer (http://bit.ly/LLname).

Whatever name you decide on, be prepared, your publisher might want something else entirely!


Writing Exercise: Write greeting card messages to the first 10 people you can think of – it can be for ANY occasion.

Writing Prompt: Open a phone book, pick any name out and describe the person based on what the name makes you feel. Do it with a few names.