I’m starting the eighth draft of my first novel and, once again, I’m changing its title. It is currently and provisionally called Love and Distraction – a name I’ve never truly been happy with.
There is something about Love and Distraction that doesn’t sit right. It might be the over obvious use of Love in the title, but Love and Virtue gets away with it, as does Book Lovers and many other romance orientated novels. It could be the obvious and dull wordplay – Love and Distraction rather than Love and Attraction – makes me roll around on the floor not laughing. It could be that I’ve never got over the demise of my first and most beloved title, Softening, even though I accidentally named a romance after a drooping erection.
Whatever it is about the title, the sad fact remains that it has to go. After a family brainstorm in the car, the new title for the work in progress will be
Somewhere In Between
A title which I’m much happier with. There is a theme running through the book of being in between places; Perry is in between jobs, Rob is in between countries, they both frequently meet on stone steps in between the community centre and the outside world. They are in between, and it’s time for my previous in between title to fade away and my first novel to be titled “Somewhere In Between”. It feels right.
