Choosing a title

One of the first things a reader sees on any story is the title. Choosing a title for a short story is a little different than a novel. If a person writes a novel and their agent or publisher thinks that the title doesn't work then they will come up with alternative titles. When a person writes a short story the title is all on them. There is no agent. There is no publisher. It's just the writer and the magazine that the writer is submitting too. So, what can you do to come up with a good title for your short story? I've been giving this a lot of thought myself because choosing a title is difficult for me. There are some simple things to do to help you come up with a good title and get your short story published.

1. Sometimes a good title comes without a story. Write it down. Keep a list. You'll find a lot of writer's blogs and books on writing that tell you to keep a little notebook on you to jot down all your ideas. Devote a page to titles. If you don't use one the titles as is it could help you come up with a different title.

2. Read over your story, is there a particular theme or point that your story is trying to convey. Did your character learn or not learn something important? This would also be a good way to come up with a title for your story.

3. Readers and critique groups. If you belong to a critique group or you have people that read your stories before you send them out you could ask for help in coming up with a title. While I've never used a reader's suggestion outright it has given me ideas and helped me out with titles.

Titles are important it's the first thing an editor of a magazine sees. If they don't like your title they won't change it. While in short story writing the writer has more control because we don't have to deal with agents or publishing houses we do have more responsibility for our work. If a magazine editor doesn't like your story you'll just get a rejection and not become published. So come up with a smashing title and reduce your chances of getting your story rejected.

Revamping the blog: July blog chain

There hasn't been a post here in awhile. I was thinking of getting rid of it. But was convinced otherwise. I have changed focus onto something I can feel more comfortable writing on. I'm going to kick off the new blog with an AW Blog chain blog post. This month's blog chain is question and answer. The first person in the chain answers a question asked by the last person in the chain. Then poster one asks poster two a question. Lady Cat was the previous poster in the chain and she asked me:

Do you believe in writer’s block, and if so, what do you do to combat it? If you don’t believe in writer’s block, do you ever suffer from days where the writing just doesn’t want to come and how do you overcome this?

I don't believe in writer's block. I think writer's block is an excuse not to write because the writer doesn't feel like writing that day, or they lost interest in what they are writing and cannot see how to make interesting again. I also believe that it affects newer writers more than writers who have been writing for awhile. Why? The new writers are still learning that writing is work and one can't always be inspired in order to write. I think this where the "myth" of writer's block come from.

How do I overcome when I just can't seem to write? Well, sometimes the best thing to do is to not write for awhile. I'm currently in school, planning my wedding, working, and packing to move in with my fiance. Since I do not depend on writing for my income I don't allow myself to feel guilty for not writing at this point in my life. You have to when you do this I believe set a date when you will start writing again. Otherwise, you'll never get back to it. I'm going to start writing again in the beginning of August after I move and I am out of school. While I will have to find a new job I won't be in school and I'll be done moving. So I'll have more time to focus on writing without having to worry about something else suffering.

During this time I didn't stop thinking about writing. I've come to the conclusion that at this time I'm not really a novel writer. I don't have the attention span needed for a novel right now. So I have decided to focus on short stories. Looking at a lot of magazines the average short story should run around 2,000 words. This I can do and the short story helps me focus on the story because I tend to ramble. The great thing about short stories is if I get stuck or I feel that the story is not going to work I can easily put it aside until later or work on something new without feeling like I'm abandoning a project that I've put loads of time in. There are a lot times when working on a new piece of writing I come up with an idea that will fix or at least change an older work enough in order for me to regain my interest in the story and fix it.

Reality: Mostly because I have not been writing at all I have not really tried out this new method of writing so I don't really know if it will work. During this time I was planning and doing research for a novel but have since decided to write it as a series of short stories and I did come up with an idea to fix a short story I have that I haven't sent out yet for submission. So this new blog is really where I'll be talking about writing short stories and how it works for me.

The next person in the blog is aimeelaine and my question to her is:
Do you write short stories or novels or both? What made you choose that medium? If you write short stories does is it disheartening that you can't make a living writing short stories like in the heyday of short story writing? If you write novels is it discouraging that it is a longer time period to see any return on your writing or that it gets rejected after all the time you put into it?

Here is everyone else in this months blog chain. Please visit their blogs and leave a comment.
DniC
BigWords
Fokker Aeroplanbau
harri3tspy
razibahmed
Forbidden Snowflake
bsolah
jen.nifer
Lady Cat
rosemerry
aimeelaine
Proach
Apelle
lostwonderer5
upsidedowngirl
JamieMT

Elevator pitch and log line

What is your story about? On Absolutewrite a website for writers. A thread came up about what makes your story special? So we had to come up with a Elevator pitch and a log line. So hear is mine.

Elevator pitch: My story is like Sybil and Mutiny on the Bounty in space.
Log line: While fighting for control of her body Emma must stop a mutiny that will put the whole colony in danger.