I have laid on my back and stared at the ceiling making soft ocean noises under my breath for an hour, trying to come up with a name for a sea goddess for one of my novels. I have scrolled through lists of baby names. I've scrolled through lists of popular names from other eras. I've sung the ABCs in my head, trying to think of a name that starts with each letter of the alphabet. I've thought of real names and then replaces a letter or a whole syllable. I've overused apostrophes in fantasy names. I've made noises until one sounded like a name. I've sat on Google translate with an English word that I felt encompassed a character's biggest trait in the first box, clicking through every available language in the second box, just looking for a jumping-off point for a name. I've used any random word I've ever seen that looked name-y as a last name.
There have been times when I've been in a flow, the words are coming and coming, look at me go! And then I need a brief interaction with a side character, or a new character, someone who in my outlining was listed as “General Sorne's personal aide,” but when the time came to write her that person needed a name. And there's a grinding of gears, a screeching of tires, progress comes to a halt. It has thrown off entire writing days. (Why is it so hard? I've named two real live actual human beings and this feels harder than that sometimes!)
And that's just character names!
I can't tell you how difficult chapter titles and, oh jeez, story or book titles can be. I mean I probably don't need to tell you. You know. You know. You've been there, staring at the screen when you try to save your document for the first time and the suggested file name is “Untitled 1” and what do you change it to?
It's stressful!
Compared to titling a book, naming characters is an absolute breeze, in my opinion.
Well I've finally figured out a method that makes that a lot easier. Granted, it works best for me, so far, on novels and chapters within the novels. For short stories (and blog posts) this method isn't as useful 100% of the time, but it has still helped.
What did it was realizing what my favorite kinds of titles are. I love titles that are pulled from a significant phrase within the book or chapter or story itself. Well, okay. I realized that way before I realized that I could do that too, but that's beside the point, I think. But I mean think about it. To use as examples a couple of really popular authors, Patrick Rothfuss and Brandon Sanderson both do this. And their book titles, especially Sanderson's Stormlight Archive books, are really evocative. I love the book “Words of Radiance,” but I also love that phrase, just the way it sounds, the image it produces in my mind. And then what it means within the narrative. So good. “The Slow Regard of Silent Things,” by Rothfuss, is the same for me. In my mind, those are perfect titles.
What this means is that for a while I save my works in progress under “Book One” file names. But it also means I'm not worrying about titles anymore. As I'm drafting I'll find the phrase. The thing I wrote that was just right, the thing that just is the title. It works for chapters, too. And sometimes while I'm editing I do have to keep an eye out for those phrases, sometimes I don't catch them as they're appearing on the page.
But it is nice to finally have figured out a method of titling books that works so well for me.