The Query Contest Advice Part I, aka The Importance of Titles

Last week I finished the query contest. *phew* Thanks to everyone for the wonderful praise and all that patience while I worked through technology issues and responded.

I requested 37 manuscripts!

I also gave out a lot of individualized advice in my replies. Some of my responses were as basic as "this just isn't for me" or "I don't represent this genre." There were times when I was confused by worldbuilding or when I didn't know what the book was about, but there were also instances where I saw some very easily fixable problems affecting a lot of people.

Here's a big one that surprised me.

THE IMPORTANCE OF TITLES

Answering this many queries in a row really emphasized this for me.

I read queries, where I saw a title and thought "That sounds so exciting!" which is the response you want. Obviously an exciting title and a not great query won't equal a request, but there were also queries I got, and the title was either a word I didn't understand, couldn't pronounce, or worse! sounded QUIET.

Your title should reflect the tone of your book. If you're writing a thriller, you don't want something long and poetic. And if you're writing something quiet and literary, you want a title that emphasizes your literary prowess.

While it's true that titles can change at a later stage in the publication process (and often do), it's really important for you to use what you have. And you have essentially a page to convince someone who doesn't know your story it's worth taking a look. So the title matters.

Even more so, when I send a requested manuscript to my kindle, the document and the title is how it's listed. So on the train, when I open up the kindle and try to decide what to read, all I've got to go on is titles. While I do really try to go in order there have been times when a title sticks out in my mind and draws my eye constantly. You want your manuscript to be the one calling to me, not something that looks confusing or even just bland.