how do you choosing titles for your work?

[TerryE]

RJ, again congrats on that acceptance. When everything is finalized, you'll have to let us know when & where to pick it up.

As far as titles are concerned, I"m never too happy with mine. They're usually just a noun describing the main part of the story. Sometimes the title writes the story, and sometimes vice versa (like most everyone else here). Now I love when the title can be taken two ways, or even several different ways. If you've ever seen the cover of Rush's album "Moving Pictures" there's at least 3 different interpretations of the phrase in the cover art. I've got one story idea that I'm trying to use nearly every English definition of a certain word in the context of the story, to give it meaning on several different levels.

But don't let the title stress you out. If you've ever seen a list of Seinfeld episodes, they always went with very simple titles (The Contest, The Jacket) with the intention of keeping the writers focused on the script and not trying to think of some cutesy title for the episode. Your title can come from a line of the story, a character name or nickname, or the theme of the tale. Some people use the last line of the story, but I usually don't like that since the whole story seems like a set-up of a joke.

[Randy D. Rubin]

Congratulations RJ! I love to hear when someone gets published, gets their foot in the proverbial door. Well done.

[RJHubbard53]

thanks, all. It is a very small piece but its better than nothing; kinda feel silly about even mentioning it but a credit is a credit, no?

[ozmosis7]

Yes, I missed that. Gratz on the acceptance.

[Craig Wallwork]

RJ - I think you need to christen the Acceptance thread. Congrats.

[RJHubbard53]

RJ - I think you need to christen the Acceptance thread. Congrats.

when it's more than an email and i have a link to the announcement, i will

[Nik Houser]

thanks, all. It is a very small piece but its better than nothing; kinda feel silly about even mentioning it

F*CK THAT. Say it loud and proud, man. You've earned it.

[mlouisdixon]

How do you choose a title for your work?

Well, use the Random Title Generator--of course!

MLD

*Got these:

Chocolate-Covered Effluvium
Impulsive Cadavers
Putrid Frogs
Frozen Humans With Digital Verisimilitude

[Dan Hocker]

Well, use the Random Title Generator--of course!

MLD

Oh man I love those random name generators. The Prison Bi*#h Name generator is the best. I think I remember my one high school history teacher being "Tossed Salad".... lol (sorry off topic)

[ozmosis7]

LOL! That is a funny site. Bookmarking it. Never know.

Ever fool with this?
http://iwl.me/

[KT Wagner]

I love this thread! I love learning about how others handle writing challenges. Titles are a hurdle for me.

Great ideas - I wish I could add something clever but...

...oh well. Back to work on my untitled WIP.

KT

[ozmosis7]

For the title of my first book, "These Trespasses" came from a repeated text. Once I had it in there twice it just sort of felt right. "Grave Revelations" actually was text I pulled out of the 1st book. Those came easy to me. Most don't though, and an interesting feature in my crit group is that they grade the title. Cafedoom has a really good structure and sometimes just getting a grade on your title makes you dig deeper.

[Kenwood]

A lot of times I just come up with a generic title at first. I can't seem to work on stories until its got a title, even a generic one. Something tells me that makes me a bit crazy. Haha.

If I can't sit back and think of something interesting, I'll then turn to looking through the story. Usually something in the writing will jump out at me. For instance, I wrote a story called "Kissing Death" a few years ago. In it, there's this line:

Despite the comfortable temperature of Logan’s room, she always found it to be cold. A deeper kind of cold; one that crept into her bones and chilled her heart.

And now the story is called "A Deeper Kind of Cold," which I like much better.

I'm also a huge music fan, so often a song title will jump out and seem perfect for something I'm working on. My story in The Zombie Feed, Vol. 1, for instance, is called "Goddamn Electric." This is a Pantera song, but it's also the perfect title for this story.

[ozmosis7]

A lot of times I just come up with a generic title at first. I can't seem to work on stories until its got a title, even a generic one.

I do that. It's rarely an untitled for long, before (say if it is a vampire story) it becomes the Bloody Sucking Tour, just for the hell of it. And over time, as I write it--I hope for a better title. If not, I now have a website to fall back on LOL.

Interesting enough, in a recent critique I had a story that translated in a different manner than I intended to our friends over the pond. So I would advise if you are sending it to a venue that isn't American, or might be intended for multiple regions--check your title and make sure it isn't something completely different, lost in translation.

[blasko66]

I usually have a working title first that's very, very basic. Something to just remind me what's what. Often it's from a song title. For instance, the last novel-length work I finished (and got rejected from Leisure's Fresh Blood contest) was titled Murder for the longest time. This was after the Ours song which was on my playlist that I listened to while writing it. (The Ours album Mercy. . . Dancing for the Death of an Imaginary Friend was a hugely inspirational album for that.) I was almost finished writing (and gearing up for revising and editing) before I changed the title to Music for the Dead and the Dying.
In the Trenches, my contest entry, had no other title. I thought it fit alright and the story was so short I didn't really need a more interesting title.