Deadlines

I’m sitting here at my computer sweating deadlines and titles. Titles are negotiable, deadlines aren’t.

I’m under deadline for my Artist’s Lane Column, a blog for my website, and the biggest deadline of all, my trip to St. Louis, Missouri. I’ll be attending a National Writer’s Conference there and I leave tomorrow.

I’ve spent every minute from 5 in the morning until 9 at night getting ready for this conference. When presenting a book to a publisher I can’t just show up with a great idea. I have to have a completed manuscript on a flash stick and a proposal.

Also, I will need to be prepared with a high-concept pitch, a killer title and a wow one line with an emotional hook. I’ll need a four-color one sheet with the branding logline and a short synopsis. I’ll also need a short bio, a long bio, business cards, and a hardcopy of three chapters, clean and tight. They all have to be in a packet, and I’ll have fifteen minutes in an interview to deliver my idea to a publisher and an agent.

The title on my second novel has been changed so many times I can’t count them all. The title has been syrupy sweet, soft, or too provocative. I finally settled on one. The publishing world says the title and a one line will sell the book to a publisher. If those two things don’t hook them, I’ll miss my chance for now to get this book published.

They say your title and your one line is like a pickup line. If you hook the publisher with those two things, then he’ll invite you to lunch. Lunch being, he’ll listen to a one-paragraph synopsis of your book. If he likes what he hears and is interested, then it’s dinner, he’ll ask for the manuscript.

When my friend told me what he thought the title should be for my book, I said, “Wow, I like it. It’ll go from the pickup line to the bedroom. It’ll miss lunch and dinner.”

I thought, The Polygamist’s Lover would be a great title. It definitely has a hook.  Another friend said he would pick up the book in a minute with a title like that. My editor friend said, “You can’t deliver that title. You can’t produce the goods. You’ll either have to change your book or change the title. Do you want to be known with that title? It smacks of a Harlequin novel. They’ll be eating your lunch.”

I had to think about it, and then I agreed. So I was back to square one with the deadline only four days away. All my material, with that smoldering title had to be changed to something else. I didn’t have a title, not even a glimmer of one. I was told that a Christian Publisher would turn that title down immediately. I was sweating bullets. That’s the reason I was going to this very expensive writer’s conference with hotel and airfare in the first place.

Three days before conference, my editor friend came up with this title. Within one day, all the promotional material was changed.

As my readers, I want to run it passed you. What do you think? It’s got to hook the publisher and the reader.

I think it’s strong, but what do I know, I liked The Polygamist’s Lover. This novel will be called for now, Under Heaven’s Rage. My one line with an emotional hook will be, “A rancher’s wife rebels against her husband’s decision to take a second wife; if she loses this battle, she will lose everything.”

Final Brushstroke! I’ll let you know if I get invited to lunch and to dinner, and if this title and one line concept sells my novel. If not, I’ll be eating and paying for my own lunch.