Titles are important things. They're identifiers, names that bring a story into a world that have their own souls and lives. They're a way of giving life to something that was once just a set of words on a page. It pulls the entire thing together.
But choosing a title is hard. It's like choosing the name of your child. That's what a book is really. It's your baby. Something that is part of you, something that you're letting out into the world to make a difference.
Some books about writing say that you should have a working title when you're writing so that you have something to work with. They strongly suggest staying away from choosing a title from the start of a project. They say that choosing the title should be one of the last things that you do. Well, I don't listen to that kind of advice. For me, actually, the title is one of the FIRST things I do. I tend to build the story around a title that sticks in my head.
Sometimes my titles are inspired by song lyrics or things like that. Lines from movies.
Titles are very important things. And I always start with them. They sometimes change. But I always start with them.
I've tried before to write with a "working title" or no title at all, and it never really works for me. I always feel as if something important is missing. Like I don't truly know my story until I know it's name. And that's really important to me as a writer, to know my story. Even if I don't always know how it's going to end or where it's going to go next, I want to feel as if I know the soul of it. The tone and the ebb and flow.
That's what comes in the title.
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