Interesting trends in novel titles.

Title trends are always fascinating. For the longest time, it was "The Someone's Daughter" or "The Someone's Wife," or a variation, "The Someone's Tale." I've wondered why it was never "The Someone's Husband" or the "Someone's Son."

Then there are the one-word titles: Divergent, Legend, etc.

But the trend you note is interesting in light of the fact that a friend of mine's second novel, just published, follows that same format. (The Pursuit of Tamsen Littlejohn by Lori Benton.)

"The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake" seems to fit that trend too, although it's a dessert instead of a name . . .

I never liked very simple or one-word titles much either. I want something unique, something that really conveys an interesting sense of what the story is about. "The Girl with Glass Feet" or "Six-Gun Snow White", for instance.

aruna said:

The Reader

Click to expand...

OT, but I absolutely could not get into The Reader. I found the writing way too sparse and the ideas under-realized. I read that it might be a German thing.

BethS said:

Title trends are always fascinating. For the longest time, it was "The Someone's Daughter" or "The Someone's Wife," or a variation, "The Someone's Tale." I've wondered why it was never "The Someone's Husband" or the "Someone's Son."

Click to expand...

THIS! I wondered if I was the only one who noticed it.

I love to examine trends. I've been trying to pay attention to buzzwords recently, particularly more in YA, since that's the genre where they seem most likely to matter. I've collected "bones", "stars", "galaxies" and "monsters" as words that seem to have captured the imagination of the current generation of writers and readers. Which is interesting to me, because of the dichotomy of the earthy, visceral "bone" and "monster" with the more ethereal "galaxy" and "star". Anyone have any to add?

BethS said:

Title trends are always fascinating. For the longest time, it was "The Someone's Daughter" or "The Someone's Wife," or a variation, "The Someone's Tale." I've wondered why it was never "The Someone's Husband" or the "Someone's Son."

Click to expand...

I'm currently rereading The Time Traveler's Wife (2003). I wonder if that was the title that started that particular trend.

PandaMan said:

I'm currently rereading The Time Traveler's Wife (2003). I wonder if that was the title that started that particular trend.

Click to expand...

Another one that I remember reading about the same time was The Memory-Keeper's Daughter.

The thing about both of those books is that they really are about the wife/daughter's function in relation to the husband/father. The Time Traveler's Wife is a story about a woman whose husband is a time traveller, and what that's like, as a wife. I don't think newer, on-trend titles like these have the same objective, necessarily.

I love The [X] of [Y] titles. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake is a beautiful title (and a beautiful book!). The Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. It needs a certain poetry about it to work, though - I don't like The Lives of Stella Bain (as a title).

Long titles are my favourite. I mean, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared? Genius. And his next book, The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden? I love. My current WIP is called The Man Who Lost His Wife in a Shell. Lay them long titles on me.

aruna said:

Funnily enough, my next book is exactly in this format; so seems like a good choice:

The Small Fortune of Dorothea Quint.

Click to expand...

Neat title. Between us, yours offers more than those others you've cited.
"Small fortune," stimulates interest.

Hmm, none of my titles fit any of those patterns. (Not that I'm published anyway.)

My titles tend to be either full sentences or puns. Sometimes both.

A few of my novels follow this trend (The blank's blank, and the one-word title). I wonder if I'm drawn towards them because of that? It's really hard for me to think of titles so I always (perhaps subconsciously) pick something that's similar to what's already out there. But then again, I think as with ideas themselves, maybe everything has already been done to some extent or another and there just happen to be trends that come and go.

Anna Spargo-Ryan said:

Long titles are my favourite. I mean, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared? Genius. And his next book, The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden? I love. My current WIP is called The Man Who Lost His Wife in a Shell. Lay them long titles on me.

Click to expand...

"For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf"? [1975]
Okay, it's a Broadway stage play but... it's the first thing I thought of when you mentioned long titles.

I don't have any such titles but I, too, love them, if done right. There has to be something there to pique the reader's curiosity.

I just did a quick check of my titles and none of them really fits the OP's mold, although I do have one that comes close: I mean, does "The Sins of the Father" count? Not really, eh. But sorta, yeh? I do, however, have a few WIP suffering the one word title syndrome but that's just because I always use the MC's name as the title while it's gestating and is always subject to change by the time it's finished.

Alexander McCall Smith has some wonderfully quirky longer titles.

There's the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series -- my favourite is Tea Time for the Traditionally Built, although In the Company of Cheerful Ladies is a close second.

In other McCall Smith series there's At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances, The Right Attitude to Rain and The Unbearable Lightness of Scones (a nod to Kundera).

But you know exactly what you're getting with titles like these. That might not extend to other authors.

When I worked in a bookshop, there was a (fortunately) short-lived trend in women's fiction (mostly) for books to be titled 'The [something] Club'. It was immensely irritating. I think I lost it when I came across 'The Hot Flash Club'.

Anna Spargo-Ryan said:

Long titles are my favourite. I mean, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared? Genius. And his next book, The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden? I love. My current WIP is called The Man Who Lost His Wife in a Shell. Lay them long titles on me.

Click to expand...

One of my favourites is 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime' - piques the interest, don't it?

Louis De Bernieres also does long titles, like 'The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts', 'Senior Vivo and the Coca Lord', and 'The Troublesome Offspring of Cardinal Guzman'

I love his South American trilogy, but I'm too chicken shit to read it again, coz it made me hurt...

My title was kinda made upped by my agent and I out of desperation to call it something, so I don't know if it will stay, but it follows the thriller formula in a way I guess - 'The [adjective noun] conspiracy'

Witch_turtle said:

"The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake" seems to fit that trend too, although it's a dessert instead of a name . . .

I never liked very simple or one-word titles much either. I want something unique, something that really conveys an interesting sense of what the story is about. "The Girl with Glass Feet" or "Six-Gun Snow White", for instance.

Click to expand...

What? No....

...YES!

Amazing title.

aruna said:

Oh yes, that "the someone's wife" etc trend irritated me no end. Why not just say who she was, instead of whose wife/daughter???

I never liked one-word titles.

Click to expand...

I like them when they incapsulate the premise or the theme of a novel. And they're at least easy to remember. But there've been some famous ones: Shogun, Outlander, 1984, Rebecca, It, Emma, Lolita, Neverwhere... and the list goes on and on.

BethS said:

Title trends are always fascinating. For the longest time, it was "The Someone's Daughter" or "The Someone's Wife," or a variation, "The Someone's Tale." I've wondered why it was never "The Someone's Husband" or the "Someone's Son."

Click to expand...

Ergh - this drove me nuts, too. Talk about minimizing females: you're not important as you, just as someone's daughter or wife. Glad to see this trend going by the wayside.

Then there are all those mystery series that seem to exist merely for clever, punny titles. I know there's probably more to them than that, but as an outsider looking in, sometimes I have to wonder if they came up with the pun and just decided to write a story to justify it. (But, then, I'm also suspicious that there's a Random Title Generator hidden deep in the bowels of major publishing companies, which they then farm out to ghostwriters. I'm not sure how else to explain the existence of a children's book series called Ninja Meerkats. And, yes, before someone jumps on me about RYFW, I mean this tongue-in-cheek...)

crunchyblanket said:

I think I lost it when I came across 'The Hot Flash Club'.

Click to expand...

lol

I like titles that are symbolic of the book's theme: A Scanner Darkly, A Clockwork Orange.

There also seem to be cover image trends. I saw an online gallery of all the Lolita covers in chronological order once and you could totally see how the different images reflected the trend of that year.

I have a lot of novels on my to-read shelf. Some titles are one word. Some are a short phrase. Some are just the name of a town, an estate, a river, or an emotion. I seldom rate a book based on its title. My own short stories (titles) vary from one word to five words. Most relate to the story in some way.

But I am a writer who always writes title first, story follows. This puts me in the minority as far as writing goes.

aruna said:

Oh! I especially dislike one-word (or two word) titles which are just a character's name! Yes, I know some of my favourite books -- including Emma, Rebecca and Jane Eyre -- fall into that category but if they were new out now I would never pick them up, just based on the title alone! So unimaginative. I mean, a name says NOTHING about a book.

Click to expand...

I would agree normally, but not with Lolita. Those first couple of lines made the title for me.

jaksen said:

I have a lot of novels on my to-read shelf. Some titles are one word. Some are a short phrase. Some are just the name of a town, an estate, a river, or an emotion. I seldom rate a book based on its title. My own short stories vary from one word to five words. Most relate to the story in some way.

But I am a writer who always writes title first, story follows. This puts me in the minority as far as writing goes.

Click to expand...

They must be very short stories