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What Makes a Title Great?

Reilith

Sage
I found a system I really like. I spend a good deal of time on goodreads, looking for books, since I can find everything there right from my chair, which fits my lazy bum and the fact that I live in the god forsaken country of Serbia. That's why most of my books come from English sections at a few good bookstores, annual book fair and the internet.
At goodreads I just type what I am generally looking for, or browse groups of a certain genre and then go from there. I look at the name, the writer, the cover and rating, if something, whatever it is attracts me, I'll look at the synopsis and then read a few high and low rated reviews of the book (without spoilers), then finally decide should I invest time into reading it or not. I got to my new favourite from Brandon Sanderson that way. Or I get a recommendation from someone which makes me research about it in the same way. Or something is hugely popular so I wanna check out what it is about.
I rarely just pick up a book at a bookstore.
 
Something I always enjoy when seeing a series in a book store, is when all the books have similar titles. It helps me link them, and also makes it a lot easier to put them in order. My favourite example would have to be Joe Abercrombie's Shattered Sea novels.
Half a King
Half the World
Half a War
And I always loved this titles, cause the idea of the story was conveyed, but it was great how the titles were often worked into the story as quotes from the protagonists i.e.
'I may be half a king, but I swore a whole oath.'
'What do we do when half the world is turned against us?'
'Only half a war is fought with swords'

You get the idea.... But titles like that, they're what grab me.
 

Heliotrope

Staff
Article Team
I read somewhere (having trouble finding the link now) that publishers prefer titles that pose questions, like mentioned earlier.

Some good examples include:

The Silence of the Lambs (Oh, oh, what happened to those poor, innocent lambs?)
Gone With The Wind (Gone where? What is gone?)
Presumed Innocent (What do you mean presumed? They weren't actually innocent? What did they do?)


Or, they prefer titles that incite conflict:

The Hunger Games implies conflict in a few ways, firstly 'hunger/starvation' and 'games/competition'.
The Game of Thrones (again, 'Game' implies competition, 'thrones' implies territory/kingdoms).
The Maze Runner (implies getting lost, having to make choices etc. But also having to do these choices quickly. There will be no sitting around in this novel).
 
Yes, I would. ;)

By they way, what do you think about books with the main character's name in the title? I own a really good book that does this but I don't like it too much, once again because it doesn't give any information about the story itself. And the "Person X and..." title was okay for Harry Potter, but it would be sort of weird to see it in another book.
Actually, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" is one of those extremely misleading titles as well because the series contains nothing alchemy-related at all.
Yes, but it has the Philosopher's Stone in it as a plot-relevant object.
 
When browsing through a book store, how often do you look at a book because of its title?

While most titles are mundane, periodically one stands out and captures the attention of readers. In your estimation, what makes a title great?
i look at the art around the title.
 

pmmg

Myth Weaver
:zombie:
Been so long since I looked through a bookstore. Most of those I buy now, are for other reasons and titles and cover art does not matter. But...I can be sucked in by a cool title. I am not sure the last one that grabbed me. I thought a wrinkle in time was a cool title, but I did not care for the story. Same with catcher in the rye and grapes of wrath, but I did like those stories better.
 
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