Thursday 16 April 2015

Help! I need somebody, help!

I finished editing my book this morning, and I have quite a lot of things I want to blog about, but I thought I would start with a problem I have.

My title.

And I need YOUR help.

My book has changed titles many times but for years now it's been called 'That Grey Area', in reference to the main theme of the book, that things are not being black and white, and to Lacie's realisation at the end that there aren't 'good people' and 'evil people'.

And I like the sound of it.

It also doesn't help readers get a sense of the book at all. But then again, book titles I love are things like 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' or 'Under the never sky', which don't really tell you what the book is about either.

So I'm a bit stuck. Should I change the title? What do you think of it?

And if I do change it, then I have an even bigger problem: what the heck am I going to call the book?

At some point the book was called The Darkness Within, in reference to a riddle inside the book (and the idea that everybody can do evil). I actually quite like this title, but I thought it made it sound too gothy (another book called The Darkness Within is a vampire book).

And if not that... well, I don't really have any ideas.
Part of the riddle also says 'If you are without sin', which could work, but again I think this gives the wrong impression.

I don't like titles that have things like Faerie in them, and I don't really want to mention the Tree Circle, e.g. I think 'The secret of the Tree Circle' sounds a bit lame.


Please leave a comment on what you think of:
- That Grey Area as a title
- The Darkness Within as a title
- Any ideas YOU have of what the title should be (though I understand that might be hard if some of you have only read bits or the synopsis).

Thank you!

~*~

Edit: I had a look at titles, following Catherine's comment.
How about 'The girl from Otherworld'. Or is that too much 'the girl with the dragon tatto'?

6 comments:

  1. Hi Soizic! I like your reasoning for 'That Grey Area', but to me the phrasing makes it sound like more of a contemporary romance rather than a fantasy. Just looking at the Goodreads YA page (http://www.goodreads.com/genres/young-adult), most fantasies have a title that is quite lyrical ('Shadow Scale')or strongly tied to the genre ('The Orphan Queen'). Names are also sometimes used (e.g. 'Ash' or 'Sabriel'). Post-Twilight, it was really common to have a one-word title, but lately the trend has been to have 'The something of x and y' (Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Gates of Thread and Stone, History of Glitter and Blood etc.). I'm not saying you need to follow a trend (actually better not to), but I'd say your title needs to convey something of the fantasy element. Perhaps use the colour grey but in a different phrasing?

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! Very useful! Only problem is I can't really think of anything else... Gah!

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  2. "That Grey Area" doesn't really evoke fantasy to me. Perhaps "This Grey Domain" could be a more fantastical version.
    The Darkness Within sounds a lot more fantastical, but isn't that distinctive.

    Here are my randomly spat out title suggestions based on the theme of light and darkness:-

    The Crepuscular Girl/Boy/Queen/King/Prince/ss - Basically because crepuscular life forms only live in twilight, at the interface between night and day. I really like the rhythm of that word, and can be used to describe a morally grey character within the story.

    Shadows borne from Light - Simplest one, because light creates shadows. It implies that good intentions can create evil.

    Morality's Rainbow : So on the nose your reader will think they've just snorted wasabi.

    Deep Grey World- A spin on "That grey area" but readers might be disappointed when they find the world isn't actually monochrome.

    Shadows rise from the light: I put "Shadows borne from light" through a "Bad Translator" on line(http://ackuna.com/badtranslator), which got creative with the language. Seriously recommend bad translators for when you are stuck on imaginative titles.

    Try out every thesaurus you can find, and collect all the words you like, and figure it out from there.

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  3. Wow! Thanks for all the ideas! I particularly like Shadows borne from Light. I tried a couple of things in the Bad Translator - thanks for the tip. It made me also think of Shadows and Light as a title, or Shadows of Light.
    I think, though, that even Shadows borne from Light doesn't quite give the right feel from the book. I'm more and more thinking I might keep one of those Grey Area/ Shadows and Light idea for the series name, and find something else for the Book 1 title.

    I'm getting quite fond of 'The girl from Otherworld' idea.

    What do you guys think of it?

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    Replies
    1. I'm glad that I've triggered some ideas. At this point, you know your story the best, so you should go with what feels right to you. The right word in the right place makes all the difference, and grammar rules can be elastic when it comes to memorable phrases.

      One exercise you can do is to try to sum up your entire story in as few words as possible. If your story is character based, it's the character arc of the primary character , or even the antagonist. Then keep cutting down until you can't cut anymore. Then try to cut down again. Forget grammar rules, just pick out the right words. Once you've drilled down to the core, you can really start thinking of the best title to sum it all up.

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  4. Je pense que je suis trop habituée à That Grey Area et peut-être pas très objective dessus du coup. Mais si tu gardes ce titre de série et que tu ajoutes "The girl fomr Otherworld" comme titre du premier tome, ça me parait pas mal. Mais encore une fois, j'ai le sentiment de ne pas être très objective. ;)

    ReplyDelete

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