katecavanaugh
patreon
Titles, Titles Everywhere! (a fun little survey)
🕑 Added 2022-09-14 22:10:51 +0000 UTC(Survey link up top for ease of access! 🔮)
So I was on a walk the other day, listening to the podcast There Are No Girls On The Internet (highly, highly recommend!) and figuratively stopped in my tracks when I heard the interviewee say the line: "Again, I think so many corners of the internet are dark and terrible for women. And the ones that are the most dark and terrible, are the ones that look the prettiest."
Then I physically stopped in my tracks so that I could text that quote, a timestamp, and a brief concept to myself:
Based on that one phrase and topic, I had a story idea. And this isn't the first time that's happened! The amount of texts I send myself, of random inspiration pulled throughout the day, is truly shocking. Lots of times they never amount to anything (or I fully forget until I read the text, much like a middle-of-the-night scribble in a journal, like "uhh what?") but sometimes....sometimes they amount to a whole new WIP.
Other random titles I've texted myself:
And recently I've been trying to get better at ~titling~ since I am, maybe, the worst person in the world at it. So anytime a cool title comes to mind, I jot it down. Sometimes without a story attached - like from a one-off lyric that I really liked - but other times with a genre, a character, or a pivotal plot point that centers around the title.
Since my last titling experiment was a few months ago, I figured I was due for another one! And I need your help again!
I created a Google Form sharing a few of the random titles I pulled from real-life inspiration. And I'm curious to see if y'all could guess or create the same stories I brainstormed from them. (If that makes sense??)
The survey asks about (1) genre, (2) how likely you'd be to pick the book up based on the title alone, and (3) a basic premise, or a trope, or some small thing you'd expect from a book with that kind of title.
The only questions required to submit the form are the multiple choice ones. All else can be skipped (if that title doesn't inspire anything from you or you're just not interested)! :)
Also, if anyone needs a title and likes these, feel free to use them!!! I think it'd be really cute to have a "take a title, leave a title," sort of vibe like last time. Only this time, I included it as part of the Form!
To that end, the last couple questions ask if you have a title you'd like to "leave" and the genre/vague concept you might have had but don't plan on using...and I'll try to guess what they were based on that title!
BONUS QUESTIONS (not on the survey, I'm just curious):
How often do you randomly think of titles? Do you have a folder on your computer where you store them all? When you're about to start a new project, do you reference back your titles list? Do you tend to build a story around a title that inspired you, or do you think of the title at the very end, or do you (like me) often have to crowdsource a title from beta readers? Bahaha.
Thanks y'all!!! :)
Comments
Kate Cavanaugh Writes
OKAY SAME. The amount of times I thought I had the perfect "real" title for Project Death, only to wake up 2 months later suddenly hating it has been several times too many bahaha.
Kate Cavanaugh Writes
NOOOOoOOoO that's the worst!! The plus side is that lots of titles are recycled and you can't technically copyright a title, as far as I know. But obviously it makes discoverability a pain to have duplicates. How do you go about finding a new perfect title when the previous one is taken??
Michelle Mahan
Titles definitely don’t always come easily to me. Once I get a story outlined, I try and think of a title, but it doesn’t always happen. Sometimes if I do manage to think of a title, I then spend way too much time trying to decide if I actually like it 😆.
Naarii
I'm the type of person that builds their stories off of characters ideas, but generally I tend to make titles based off the concept of the book. Oddly enough it ends up being the perfect title. Then I Google the title, find out it's been taken already and cry. 🤣🤣🤣
