Next Noble Pen Meeting

August 31st, 2017 at 7 pm

Scott’s Family Restaurant

1906 Blairs Ferry Rd NE, Cedar Rapids

News

The Hugo Awards for science fiction were recently announced.

Victories

Aime has the cover for her Time Traveler Blues short story.

Ciuin has Petty Theft done with new scenes and twists.

Shannon fixed his short story, now done at 5,000 words.

Education

Picking a good title for your book can be difficult.  Of course, if you get a major publisher they will probably dictate the title.  This article lists several well-known books with the authors’ working titles for comparison, and offers lots of good advice.

If you are picking a title yourself, you need to consider many factors.  The title should fit the genre, and whether it does can be a matter of opinion.  Short is good –two to four word titles usually work best.  Memorable is great.  I think the title should appear naturally somewhere in the prose , and the reader should understand a connection to the title after reading the book.

You can’t use a rip-off of something popular like Harry Potter’s New Adventure.  The first link above discusses that issue.  However, titles are generally not protected by copyright, so It can be a title that has been used before, and some titles appear on many books.  Scott Berkum offers many thoughts on picking titles.  Here’s more advice.

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. ~William Shakespeare

We don’t have to think up a title till we get the doggone book written.
~Carl Sandburg

Upcoming Schedule

August 31
Dylan
Ciuin
Aime

September 7
Nick
Aime (?)
Open slot

September 14
Randy
Open slots

September 21
Open slots

September 28
Open slots

Keep Writing,
Bill