So while I was on my little break last week, my friend Reece interviewed me! You can check out the interview here.
Also last week, I got an email from a crit partner, and it brought up something that was a recent frustration for me. The problem? Titles. Not coming up with titles. (That's a pain in the rear in its own right.) But what happens when you find a perfect title, and then it turns out another book has the same one, or a similar one?
With my current WIP, I found a quote that fits the book PERFECTLY. And from that quote, I got the perfect title: The Unhappening of Genesis Lee. I came up with it months ago, right at the beginning of my planning process, and got a little giddy about it. Then someone burst my bubble.
Literally two days after I picked it, I heard about a new book coming out (in fact, it came out yesterday!). You may have heard of it too. The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer. Argh! The titles aren't the same, not exactly. And there are plenty of books that are "The ___ of ___." But the similarity of Unbecoming/Unhappening made me very pouty. (Not that I'm dissing Michelle Hodkin. The book sounds awesome, and I can't wait to read it.)
Her book is published. Mine is not. What's a girl to do?
Not worry about it, that's what.
I'm not saying to give your book a generic title that twelve other books share, and if your title is similar to too many others, maybe you should change it. But when you find the title that expresses your book, that hints at tension, that asks a question, that makes people want to read more-- keep it. If it ever gets published, it could likely change anyway, but you can still use a catchy title to get an agent's attention.
Some books have similar titles, there's no getting around it. In fact, Aprilynne Pike just announced the fourth book in her series that shares a title with another book-- also very popular-- that's coming out around the same time. The books are different enough, and Aprilynne says the title fits so perfectly, that it can work.
So, my friends, has this ever happened to you? Did you change the title, or keep it? How do you come up with your titles?
