Where's the Imagination?
While romance has always had its fair share of silly titles or vague and somewhat interchangable titles, when I go back through my older romances and UBS finds, there seems to be a lot more variety in titles than what I see now. I notice this particularly in historicals and series titles, probably the two categories I read the most. A book title might not tell me exactly what I’ll find in In the Midnight Rain, Perchance to Dream or Mistress of Mellyn, but they do spark one’s imagination. They make me wonder where the reference comes from or who is this Mistress of Mellyn anyway?
Lately, though, it seems like the titles lack imagination. There are still a few good ones out there, but I’ve noticed a trend(especially with historical and series books) that leans more toward titles along the lines of Seduced at Midnight, To Sin With a Stranger, Mommy in Training or Hotly Bedded, Conveniently Wedded. Somehow these titles just don’t have the same ring to them.
For starters, something about these kinds of titles makes them all feel interchangable. When I see these books out on a shelf, I often have trouble remembering which Duke, spy, billionaire, etc… I liked and which I can give to the library sale. It all just runs together. In addition, these sorts of titles miss out on the intrigue factor and at worst, make me feel like my intelligence is being insulted by the publisher – and not even subtly. When I see a really cool title on the shelf at a store, I immediately pick it up out of curiosity. Not much that I see nowadays, particularly in the historical or Harlequin/Silhouette lines, has that intrigue factor for me.
And that’s a shame. There are lots of good books and talented authors out there, and crappy titles sell them short. Reading engages the imagination and for me, clunky or silly titles spell lack of that quality. I can’t help wondering how many readers like me have walked right by a treasure of a book simply because they aren’t familiar with the author and a title along the lines The Desert Prince’s Proposal isn’t exactly subtle enough to capture their curiosity.
-Lynn Spencer
The Shadow and the Star is a beautifully evocative title
For My Lady’s Heart is just both so romantic and so apt
Of course they were published a bunch of years ago.
Absolutely! I’ve even stopped buying some of the HP authors I am familiar with because of the titles. Do I really need to read about “”The ___ Billionaire’s _____ Mistress”” again? I’m sure I’ve got a couple copies of that title already.
I also loathe “”Sin”” titles. They’re just trying to dirty the titles up to make them seem more provocative. Try telling somebody To Sin With a Stranger is about the love.
I hate the generic naming of books and it really seems like it would hurt book sales – maybe not for established authors but certainly for the up and coming. For example, I love Lisa Kleypas’ writing, but I often can’t remember which book is which when they’re referred to on the message boards, etc. without plot discriptions. I feel the same about Jo Goodman’s books and Kresley Cole’s (and I’m sure there are others out there that I can’t think of right now). The only books Kleypas has that I can tell apart just from the titles are the Wallflowers because of the connection to the seasons and her two contemporaries.
Even the Harlequin Presents used to have evocative titles. Charlotte Lamb became known for single-word titles like Fever and Sensation, but she also had titles such as Savage Surrender and Girl from Nowhere. Also, from other authors, I remember reading books with titles such as Dragon’s Lair, A Secret Sorrow, and The Wilder Shores of Love. They often told you what the book was about without screaming it. :)
If Angels Burn is a haunting title. That’s one that caught my eye, too. Every month I run through the H/S offerings and place an order. I used to be tempted by all kinds of series books simply because of the titles. This month? Not so much.
A now defunct romance website would always include “”best title”” in its year-end poll. I do remember “”Darkling I Listen”” by Katherine Sutcliffe winning one year. Those words are from a John Keats poem.
Pun titles are excused for Piers Anthony though :)
I’d rather have bland, though, over those god-awful pun titles. I have grown to loathe them with the fiery passion of a thousand…no, TEN thousand suns!
But I totally agree that titling is in a bad place right now.
For me, I found an very intriguing world when I bought Lynn Viehl’s first Darklyn novel solely because of its title, If Angels Burn. I still find that title haunting.