A Novel Diary

 

Chapter 2: Title Hell
By Elaine Viets

NOTE: This is a continuing series about my May 2013 Dead-End Job Mystery, from conception to publication.

 I’d rather write a whole novel than name it. Choosing a title is the hardest part of writing a mystery. I have to capture a 75,000 word novel in a few words.

Because I write funny mysteries, the task is even harder. Funny mysteries often have punny titles. Make the title too punny, and my novel will be dismissed as fluff by readers and reviewers. Too serious, and I’ll mislead them.

My editor, Sandy, and I had a theme for my new Dead-End Job mystery: It would be set in the cutthroat world of South Florida beach concessions, where there’s killer competition for the money spent on kayaking, paddleboarding, parasailing, and other beach sports.

Now we needed to name our baby. I had to produce a synopsis and lists of titles that would be shot down until we found a good one. I’d entered Title Hell.

Luckily, my editor is not like the red demon in "The Fall of the Damned" by the 14^th century Flemish painter Dieric Bouts. She’s tough but fair. But I’d go through a hell of a lot of titles before we chose one.

I started with this synopsis for my nameless DEJ mystery:

It's set on the beach in South Florida. A company gives lessons for standup paddleboarding and parasailing. The company owner says a competitor is sabotaging his business, but most people think the guy is a crank. The PI team of Phil and Helen try to find out if anyone is ruining the man's business. Helen works at the rental stand while Phil poses as a beer-drinking tourist to catch the saboteur. A woman is killed parasailing and the company may have to close, unless Helen and Phil can prove her death was murder -- and find the killer.

"I suppose we can’t call it Son of a Beach?" I emailed Sandy. Once I had that terrible title out of my system, my mystery-loving friends sent lists of titles, including Stiff on a Board, Murder Is a Shore Thing, Beached, Death on the Line, Murder on the Wings, Murder in the Wind, Death of A Beach Babe, Stand Up and Die, Paddles and Perils, A Stand-up Death, Peril Sailing, and A Perfectly Safe Death. I liked the last title. It had a sophisticated Alfred Hitchcock touch. I was sure my editor would choose it.

She didn’t. Sandy ran the titles past many publishing pros at Penguin. They liked Murder Is a Shore Thing.

That was my last choice. I thought it was too fluffy.

"I'm concerned that title will be hard to remember and hard to find in the bookstores’ online catalogues," I wrote Sandy. "Barnes & Noble’s system is especially unforgiving. If someone calls my mystery  Murder Is a Sure  Thing instead of Shore Thing, the B&N computer may say it’s not in stock."

I tried bargaining.  "They really didn't like A Perfectly Safe Death? That's what everyone says when you try a dangerous sport. How about A Perfectly Safe Murder?  If you really don't want that, can I try to find another title?"

Sandy gently reminded me that I’d suggested Murder Is a Shore Thing first, it was easy to remember and it tied into the subject. My favorite, A Perfectly Safe Death, didn’t do any of that.

Many editors wouldn’t bother humoring a writer. They’d choose a title and I’d have to live with it.

Sandy said she’d try to think of new titles, but she needed a title that day. She also wanted Helen to have a bigger role in this novel.

Now I was deep in Title Hell – rejected with a deadline looming.

Sandy sent more titles, including Murder at High Tide, Death Goes to the Beach, Death Catches a Wave, and Death Makes a Splash. She also agreed to reconsider Beached, A Coastal Killing, Death of a Beach Babe, and Seaside Sabotage.

Meanwhile I phoned some friends on their sailboat. (Cell phones are wonderful inventions.) They were on a boozy cruise and primed to brainstorm.

The boaters said I made a landlubber's mistake: A shore is where the water meets the land but there may or may not be a beach at the shore. They also suggested I write about a paddleboard murder, since a parasailing title might confuse readers with "Final Sail," my Dead-End Job mystery about yachting. I rewrote the synopsis so a paddleboarder was murdered. The boaters gave me these titles: Board Stiff, Board to Death, The Board Game Murder. 

I sent them to Sandy and sweated. Would I be released from Title Hell?

At last, I got the verdict. The new book would be called – Board Stiff.

Hallelujah!

 

Comments

[Storyteller Mary]

I have a new appreciation of all the work you do to give us those fun, clever titles . . . Thanks! (and looking forward to it ;-)

[Elaine Viets]

As you can tell by this blog, I get by with a little help from my friends, Mary.

[lil Gluckstern]

I laughed at all the titles, and Now I can look forward to Board Stiff. There is so much work that goes into a book that gives so much pleasure.

[Elaine Viets]

The work has just started, Lil. Wait till you read about the research.

[Charlaine Harris]

Board Stiff is great, but I really adore Son of a Beach.

[Elaine Viets]

You would have loved the rejected title for "Just Murdered," where I killed the mother of the bride. I wanted to call it "One Dead Mother." That title was nixed as "too urban."

[Storyteller Mary]

Maybe there can be a future blog on all the vetoed titles . . .

[Elaine Viets]

"Dead-End Job" was my title for "Shop till You Drop." Genny, my then editor, decided it made a better series.

[marie]

Thanks for sharing the all the hard work it took to come up with a great title, Elaine.
You have such a great sense of humor. I always enjoy your blogs about your writing journeys.
I am patiently waiting until next spring for your new release.

[Elaine Viets]

Thanks, Marie. A novel is a group effort. The fun has just started.

[Storyteller Mary]

You do have a great editor -- you make a great team!

[Deb Romano]

Elaine, I really love your sense of humor!

I can't wait to see what you say when you blog about the research. We all know that whatever you say will definitely be very entertaining!

[Sally Goldenbaum]

Elaine, I love this blog! You have captured my own problems and feelings about titles so perfectly (right down to our mutual respect for an editor named Sandy!). Thanks for sharing this.

[Elaine Viets]

Blog readers, get to know Sally Goldenbaum's Seaside Knitters series. It's a fun cozy read.

[krisneri]

Elaine, love the new title! You were wise to fight for a title readers would find easier to remember. They are notorious about getting a bit of a title wrong, and they'll argue their version is right to the death. And book databases are quite specific, even with looser keyword searches. I don't know what I would do without Google. I just put in long strings of everything they think they know about particular books, and that usually turns up the right titles. But if I counted on customers knowing titles exactly, I'd hardly be able to fulfill any special orders.

[Elaine Viets]

You own a bookstore, Kris, so you know how hard it is to look up a title. When I worked as a bookseller, I'd have readers say, "I can't remember the author or the title, but it was a mystery and the cover was blue."

[sydney]

Good job!

[Elaine Viets]

Thanks, Sydney. Hope you'll think it's a good read when it's finished.