o. writing help

TITLING A STORY

to help you come

up with a unique

title for you story

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☆彡 TIPS

→ don't settle on a title until the whole book is written. as we all know, sometimes characters, or even a whole story, take on a mind of their own - your story may not end up where you expected it to. therefore, by the time you're done with that final chapter, the title you picked before you started may not make sense. it's more than normal to have a working title while you write but i advise you to wait on confirming one until the whole writing, revising, and editing process is complete.

→ note that most titles are short - typically 2-4 words. naturally, my brain first went to something that could contradict this: the harry potter series. however, if you take out the "harry potter and - " part, the titles are still less than five words (the prisoner of azkaban, the deathly hallows, etc). you have to be able to draw in someone's eye and if your title is too long, they may just scan right past it. if you have to make it longer, consider a subtitle.

→ if you're writing fiction, think about using a character or repeating theme/phrase from your book as the title. it's something that will make sense and, if interesting enough, will attract attention.

→ in the event that you're writing a series, think of something that can thread throughout the series. j.k. rowling used "harry potter and-," janet evanovich uses numbers, james patterson used nursery rhymes —- you'll be next in that list!

→ include words that are lively, intriguing and fresh to attract your reader's interest. if you're writing nonfiction, create a title that will make readers want to pick up your book and find out more about your topic. people love the idea of finding out something they didn't know before, or even better, inside information that other people may not know.

☆彡 BRAINSTORMING

→ find twenty books on amazon, wattpad, goodreads that are in the same genre as yours and whose titles you like. write down their titles. try to get a feel for what works with your genre. what do you like about the titles? what don't you like? then put the list away for awhile.

→ sit with a pencil and paper (and maybe your critique group and a white-board) and free-associate, making lists of words related to your book. put them in columns: nouns, verbs, adjectives. if it's a novel, list words that describe or suggest the setting. then think about each of your major characters and write down words that relate to them. think about the action in the story and write down verbs that capture it. if your book is non-fiction, list words that capture what you want your reader to think, feel or do after reading it. and words that describe what your book is about.

→ nothing is off limits—write down anything you can think of that conveys anything about your book. Use visual words that suggest a scene. Other words that evoke an emotion. A sensation. A location. A question. You should have at least 100 words.

→ see if any of the words would work as a single-word title. then start experimenting with different word combinations. adjective-noun, verb-noun. keep a thesaurus handy and look up other words. write down as many word combinations as you can. try not to self-censor at this stage.

→ from these lists, come up with at least 20 possible titles. then put them away for 24 hours. two things will happen: your subconscious may still be working on it; and when you come back to your list, you'll have fresh eyes.

→ go back to your title list. add any new ideas you've had. then narrow it down to three to five possibilities. run them by a few people. (this may or may not help, depending on if there's a consensus or the opinions are all over the map.) take a little more time before narrowing it down to one. if you can, wait another day or two.

→ remember your list of titles from your sources? go back to it. ask yourself if the title you've chosen would fit the list—without being too similar or generic.

to ask about your title: does the tone of the title match the tone of the book? does it convey the right genre (including time period if applicable)? would it attract attention? ff the book were spine-out on the shelf (so the cover and sub-title were not visible) would it still attract attention? would a reader have any idea what the book is about just from the title? (sometimes important for non-fiction.)

i'm so excited for infinity war

i'm actually going to cry bc i'm

watching it twice this weekend

lol and i'll also be picking the

admins by the end of this week

or next week. go to the last

chapter "important" if you don't

know what i'm talking about

i hope this helped !!