Creating Titles/Plots Seperately.

Just wondering, 'cause it's something I've been doing recently.

I like to have titles that are catchy, or play with words, or just sound good. If I hear a word or a phrase that sounds like it'd fit the job, I write it down before I forget it, and I now have a list of various titles on MS Word.

The funny thing is... most of the various plot ideas that I have don't actually go with any of the titles in my list.

So! Sometimes, if I'm really stuck for plot ideas, or I just feel like all of the ones that I have are going nowhere, I pick a title and try and think up a plot for it, rather than the other way around. That's actually what I'm doing for my current story, although the title no longer fits, which is rather interesting...

Anyway, who else does this, and how do you do it? Had any fun experiences? Also, got any titles you'd like to share with the rest of us?

I do that sometimes, actually! See, for my story I wanted to call it "The Oil Mark" because it just sounded cool to me, but it didn't fit at all into it. Then I tried to shape the story around the title and now it's a more interesting plot. I think...

I've never done this before until my recent one. I was brainstorming for a new short historical piece and came up with the name The Poorly Kept Girl. I thought that was the best title in the world, and was so pleased with it that I didn't even begin to think what the plot was or why this girl was poorly kept.

Now I'm not so sure the title fits or the plot, though I haven't tried hard enough.

I've done it, now and then without a conscious thought, I think. o0' Though I don't collect titles like Kay. I tend to collect names without characters rather than titles sans plot.

And you're right about Poorly Kept Girl, Myth--brilliant title. I can't quite imagine what it it would be about; it seems like it could be any number of things, all with a sad, sort of threadbare sound. ^_^

I only ever did that once, and it went horribly wrong for me, so I've decided to stick with having my titleless stories-I can never think of any!

I do the same thing Imp! I hoarde characterless names and stick them into a little notebook for safe-keeping ^^

Poor Imp wrote:And you're right about Poorly Kept Girl, Myth--brilliant title. I can't quite imagine what it it would be about; it seems like it could be any number of things, all with a sad, sort of threadbare sound. ^_^

That's exactly what I was thinking, fortunately this doesn't involve death but it is meant to be sad. I think.

Ooh, that is a good title...

Usually, I do this with chapter or section titles- I don't write enough different things to have experience.

When I get them, though, they're completely ripped off of lines from other authors, for example: "Summer Soldiers and Sunshine Patriots" (Thomas Paine), "Genius in Soiled White" (Upton Sinclair, whose name was also used for one of my characters ) , "Conquer We Must" (Francis Scott Key)...you can sort of guess the rest. XD Hooray for classics!

I usually have the story come first, and then add a title. Right now, I'm using the title COLORS, which each narrator's section having a color as a title. So, the violent one is RED. The criminal is BLACK (that sounded racist). The womanizer is PINK. And the calm one, which minds his own business, doesn't do any drugs, and has a job is WHITE.

So, I'm happy.

Icaruss -- that sounds like a pretty cool way of doing it. Sort of symbolic.

I... come up with a plot. I actually sort of suck at titles. Until I can get real characters (or real in my mind) to identify with, I'm totally lost. So there!

I think I have two titles though...

Death to Cheese -- probably a short story?

Too Happy to be Sober -- a country song, perhaps?

Snoink -- I like that last one... sounds fun!

Thing is, with me, sometimes I hear something that just sounds so good for a title, I have to write it down...

I think I have about seven at the moment. (roughly)

Snoink wrote:Too Happy to be Sober -- a country song, perhaps?

I also like that title.

I have found that oxy-morons are very useful for interesting topiced stories for

1. They make the reader think, and say,"wait a minute."
2. They catch the reader's eye, and make them want to see what the story is.
3. They "can" make the reader laugh and laughing is always good.
4. Oxy-morons are fun to think of.

Or you can use very extraordinary titles,(e.g. pink penguins with pens!), they do they same things, and arent hard to think of, for the average discussion topic.

You can also use reverse psychotic titles (e.g. Don't Read this), because they also do the same things, usually more effectively, but almost as hard to think of as the oxy-morons...

keep writing guys and =) happy reading (=