Comments on: Fun With Romance Titles

By: Diane Farr

Diane Farr — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 23:51:20 +0000

Hilarious! Book titles are always the last, desperate battle an author wages before relinquishing control forever. One normally has lots of control over the book’s content, a smidgen of control over the title, and no control whatsoever over the cover art. Authors’ working titles are routinely discarded, and then you are asked to come up with a string of alternates for your editor to choose from. But, looking at your list, I wonder if this system has lately been turned on its head? Looks like the marketing dept. generates a series of titles, and the author is forced to choose the least awful from among them!

By: hapax

hapax — Tue, 31 May 2011 19:11:07 +0000

All righty, I just have to give a shout out to Elizabeth Mansfield’s THE COUNTERFEIT HUSBAND, which might easily have been titled TO TEMPT A DESPERATE FOOTMAN, or something of the sort.

I admit that it’s Old Skool and terribly implausible, but the hero *is* a real live footman and not a duke in disguise or anything like that, so points for trying!

By: Ann Stephens

Ann Stephens — Tue, 31 May 2011 18:10:03 +0000

Thank you so much for this article! It gave me a good laugh to start my work week. Hmmmm, ‘To Tempt a Purple Spinster’…there’s an image.

By: Carly M.

Carly M. — Mon, 30 May 2011 12:41:20 +0000

To those requesting a footman hero, I would recommend Emily Bryans novella in the anthology ” A Christmas Ball”. A romance between the stable master and a bastard-daughter-of-the-Earl maid, it’s really delightful and full of hijinks.

By: Lynne Connolly

Lynne Connolly — Sun, 29 May 2011 22:45:34 +0000

Re the list of names. I can’t remember any female names, but there is a similar list of words not to be used in titles. Of course, with EC producing BDSM books, you have to be careful with words like “bondage” and “tied,” but there are others that have just been overused and don’t have the same impact they used to. I don’t think the list is public. just for the use of EC authors, I’m afraid. But I’m sure they’d love to hear of any names you think have been overused.

By: elaine mueller

elaine mueller — Sun, 29 May 2011 20:01:23 +0000

several years ago i was a coupla friends in n’orleans and we’d had a few drinks. laughing over the titles given to books coming from a particular publisher that produced a lot of romances set in the american west, we began making up our own to fit the theme of native american tribe + occupation.

i think cherokee cowboy was an actual title, but we thought that was too tame and common. how ’bout

arapaho accountant!
ute urologist!
dakota doorman!
pawnee process-server!
comanche cook!

but most laughable title ever, imho, ana leigh’s “Proud Pillars Rising.’ i kid you not.

elaine

By: SusiB

SusiB — Sun, 29 May 2011 18:19:35 +0000

There’s also a list of hero’s names that they would prefer we don’t use. Headed by Lucian/Luke/Lucius and versions of the same. There were a flood of them a few years back. Also angel’s names, Gabriel, Rafe/Raphael, all those. Very handy, I wish more publishers did it!

Exactly. You can't imagine how astonished I was when I recently read a romantic suspense whose villain was named Rafe. All through the book I thought, come on, you can't fool me. I know he will turn out to be the hero in the next book of the series. But he didn't! The hero of this book just killed him!

By: Anna C. Bowling

Anna C. Bowling — Sat, 28 May 2011 19:34:18 +0000

Lynne, that list of hero names a publisher would prefer not to see sounds useful. Do they have a list of heroine names as well?

By: Trace

Trace — Sat, 28 May 2011 15:54:57 +0000

And the footman should stay a footman, not a ‘Duke in Disguise’ or an ‘Earl on a mission for the King’, just your typical, run of the mill, gorgeous footman

By: Sandy C.

Sandy C. — Sat, 28 May 2011 13:54:22 +0000

http://facstaff.unca.edu/pbahls/TitleGenerator.html

I know it’s snarky, but the titles are pretty funny on the above “Random Romance Novel Title Generator”.

I’m happy to say that the Harlequin Presents titles are getting better, but in the defense of their “titling department” or area, can you imagine trying to find a unique title for the 3,500th book?! That can’t be easy!

I’d like to add a phrase to Part 1: “At the Mercy of”, i.e. “At the Mercy of the Desperate Footman”. (Yup, there’s that footman again!)