Fanfic Title Meme

[deemoyza]

Swiped from runicmagitek because it seems like fun! Anyone else reading this, feel free to swipe, as well! :D

Look at the most recent 20 fanwork titles on your AO3 account.

1. How many are you happy with?
2. How many are... not great?
3. How many did you scramble for at the last minute?
4. How many did you know before you started writing/creating, or near the beginning?
5. How many are quotes from songs or poems?
6. How many are other quotes?
7. Which best reflects the plot of the story/content of the fanwork?
8. Which best reflects the theme of the story/fanwork?
9. Which best reflects the character voice of the story/POV of the fanwork?
10. Which is your favorite?


Snapshots [FF8]
Driver's Education [FF8]
Noise [Transistor]
Walk in Shadow [FFX]
Provocatrice [Transistor]
Bodyguard [Transistor]
Presentable [Transistor]
Just a Girl [Transistor]
Let the Rain Fall [Transistor]
With All Due Respect [FF8]
Break [Transistor]
Now You See Me... [FF8]
Evening Edition [FF8]
Mistaken [FF8]
Two Halves of Nothing [Illusion of Gaia]
Summer Rain [Transistor]
Daybreak [FF8]
Ozone [FF8]
Where I Belong [FF8]
First [FF8]

1. How many are you happy with?
Three, bolded above.

2. How many are... not great?
The rest. XD I really struggle with titles, and have a terrible habit of making them a single, usually nondescript, word. (Ugh, I really hate "Noise"; the story deserved better, but I'm completely stumped.)

3. How many did you scramble for at the last minute?
Most of them. In most cases, I title the story after I finish writing it, and since I'm usually very eager to get a finished story out there, the title usually suffers for my impatience.

4. How many did you know before you started writing/creating, or near the beginning?
Six ("Snapshots", "Walk in Shadow", "Provocatrice", "Break", "Summer Rain", and "Where I Belong"). A bit contradictory, given what I just said above, but these are special cases, in which the title was a point of inspiration for the rest of the work.

5. How many are quotes from songs or poems?
Two. No song lyrics, but titles: "Summer Rain" (Belinda Carlisle) and "Where I Belong" (FF8 OST). ("Just a Girl" has no relation to the No Doubt song. XD)

6. How many are other quotes?
None. :(

7. Which best reflects the plot of the story/content of the fanwork?
"Driver's Education", definitely, since it's a fic about Nida learning to drive. "Evening Edition", too, since it's an FF8 newsroom AU.

8. Which best reflects the theme of the story/fanwork?
Going to list a few, here because I'm stubborn and don't want to choose. "Provocatrice" plays not only on the name of a perfume Sybil gave Red in an earlier fic, but also on the inadvertent affect Red has on Sybil. "Break" works on two levels, with Red using the privacy of the Bracket Towers breakroom to finally break down. "Two Halves of Nothing" references Will's and Lance's fathers, one missing, the other suffering from amnesia, leaving both boys with no answers as to what happened on their fathers' ill-fated expedition. And "Where I Belong" not only calls to mind Selphie's scenes at Trabia Garden, but also poses a question she will ponder as she discovers more about her identity and the place she came from (eventually; I have to get back to working on this one!).

9. Which best reflects the character voice of the story/POV of the fanwork?
I don't feel like any of them really do, but "Where I Belong" might come the closest, given how I described it above.

10. Which is your favorite?
"Two Halves of Nothing"

Comments

[runicmagitek]

I love the simplicity of your titles! Sometimes I come up with ones that are like, fifteen words long, and I have to sit my brain down and explain that's the opposite of reasonable. Also BIG SAME when doing titles last-minute D: very rarely do they strike me mid-draft, let alone before I even write a damn thing. I'm always in awe of people who bang out titles like it's nothing. But at least you're not alone in Team What Are Titles 💕

[deemoyza]

Thank you! :D

Oftentimes, I think that easily coming up with titles is a knack that writers either have or don't. And from what I've seen among other writers and even advice articles, I'm led to believe it's a rare knack, at that. XD