To Title or not to Title that is the question

[Tnonk]

Do you create the title for your work first (or work from a title), does it come as you develop the story or do you wing it 'til the end & hope to come up with something before it goes to the agent?
For my novel, I was driving a truck making deliveries. I stopped at this business, Thunder Bay, & BAM the story just seemed to hit me all at once - it was an incredible feeling. I couldn't write it all down fast enough. I knew what I wanted to do from start to finish. I think I wrote nearly 30 pages of notes in 2 days or so.
So, for me, it all started with the title.
What about you?

Adrian

[dpaterso]

Yeah, a title definitely helps me focus as well as spawning and growing ideas. Knowing the title up front also gives me a filename I can easily recognize instead of WIP27.doc

-Derek

[Mumut]

The first book's title came to me early in the writing process and it was very useful to keep a few ideas in character. The sequel, I only thought of a name after it was finished and polished. This was a disadvantage. I'm still not a hundred percent happy with the name, even though I've signed a contract with one publisher in Australia and I'm waiting for the one for Canada/USA. I've given the third book a name, but again, I'm not happy with it. It's only a quarter written, though, so I really should have a brainstorming session with myself to find a suitable name.

[TheSauce]

I'll slap a general identifier onto something until I have an idea, whether it just be a song title that I associate with the story, a genre tag(example: A Cyberpunk Love Story), or really anything that'll help me identify it and what I want to put in it; it helps me get at least a word or two onto the screen to take off from. The title almost always changes by the time I'm done, though.

[Riley]

If I don't have a title, chances are I won't be writing a complete story. A title helps me focus and also helps me figure out the tone and mood of the tale. The name might change several times before I'm done, but I just simply have to have a title or nothing's going to happen.

[Toothpaste]

I am so bad at titles, and have got to the point where I just give my MS a nickname till it's done.

But I do have to say there are times when you see a sign, or come up with a phrase and just think it would make a great title. Those actually rarely turn into books for me though. Odd huh?

(Thunder Bay is also a town here in Ontario!)

[Eldritch]

Most of my novels started out with their titles.
Titles for my short stories usually came about after the story was written.

[Elodie-Caroline]

With the very first novel I started writing, I had the title first and then made my story from that.
With my second one and its sequel, now as one, I had the story all written down and have so far changed the title/s 4 times... I'm sticcking with the title I have now though.



Elodie

[She Raven]

Hi, I start with a working title, then as the plot unfolds, I decided if the title is still approiate.

[JacobWorld]

Look . Reaseach proved that people like shelfs and there is nothing to we can do about it . It doesnt matter what you do you will always find yourself on one of them . Even if you dont give it a title, people will do it for ya . It many not be the title you want though.

[DragonHeart]

I always start with a title. I feel lost if I try to write something without the title at the top. Most of the time if I don't have the title, I don't have a story. It'll just be a blank screen and I will stare at it until the title comes. It may just be a working title, but it has to be present before I can start writing.

~DragonHeart~

[Sage]

My titles seem to be better if I come up with a real one early in the writing of the novel (as opposed to ones I know are placeholders for the real title). My writing doesn't seem to suffer when I don't have a title, and I have definitely written stuff and not found the title until after I was finished.

[steveg144]

The title always seems to come first for me. And once the title's had time to percolate in my brain for a bit, the story itself seems to appear whole, intact, and complete.

[DeleyanLee]

Seems I'm the odd one out. I generally don't have a title when I start writing because I'm a complete pantser and have little idea of what the story is before I'm about 100 pages into it. It's actually rare that I have even a working title for a brandy new MIP. Usually I have one before I've hit the mid-point of the book, though.

Since I've never not had a title by the time of submission, it's not something to concern myself with.