A Change of Title / New Query Letter, Too

[ahunter3]

I've changed the title of my book.

Well, the portion after the colon-is that more properly referred to as its subtitle?

OLD: The Story of Q: A GenderQueer Tale
NEW: The Story of Q: From a Queerly Different Closet
To explain why, I am going to have to drop back and explain why the original title. As I said in my introductory post on this

Comments

[old_cutter_john]

As I read these journal entries, all sorts of thoughts cross my mind, and I neglect to write most of them, partly because they're too fragmentary, and partly because I haven't read any of what you've posted on your little bit of the Internet, so I imagine many of my thoughts will turn out to be irrelevant or redundant. Today I'll comment. Maybe it'll be worth something to you; maybe it won't.

I find the new title æsthetically displeasing, whatever its merits.

This bit of writing by nickykaa might be useful to you. nickykaa is fighting the same sort of battle, but as a member of a different group.

You might want to address the way in which the acceptance of gay marriage further marginalizes poly folk. (One o' them things that might be redundant: maybe you already do this.)

It occurs to me that there are probably any number of marginalized splinter groups like the one you represent. Your story would have wider appeal if you claimed to represent all of them, if only for political purposes, rather than just the one.

[ahunter3]

First off, to make it unanimous, I'm not thrilled with the new title EITHER! Rather than respond to each person's individual comment on the title change, I'm going to respond to my own posting as a way to respond in a collective way to the collective opinion that it's not a very good book title.

---

There are two recurrent and interrelated comments or lines of thought that have cropped up quite often over the years in which I've been trying to do this:

• What is it that you hope to accomplish? What's your goal, your ideal outcome, if your efforts were to succeed?

• Why do we need to identify and "have liberation" for this or that specified out-group? Shouldn't we just have human liberation, embrace the ideal of equality for absolutely everybody and leave it at that? I mean, by identifying yourself or your group as ThesePeople™, you're adding more energy into the old tired labels that labeled you as ThesePeople™ to begin with; if you don't wish to be treated differently, that seems kind of counterproductive

[anais_pf]

OCJ's comment made me realize I don't care for your new title, either. However, I don't have a better suggestion, and it's possible you're right about the "genderqueer" label. But you know what, I think quite a few books have their titles changed by the publishers anyway. You do want something catchy and descriptive . . . but maybe someone else will come up with a better title.

I do love your query letter, still.

[ahunter3]

I'm not thrilled with the new title EITHER! Rather than respond to each person's individual comment on the title change, I'm going to respond to my own posting as a way to respond in a collective way to the collective opinion that it's not a very good book title.

[khall]

Not a huge fan of the new title either. It is...too clever, I think. Sounds...self-satisfied or...know-it-all or something. I don't know how to explain it. I don't have anything better either. Yes, that is the sub title.

I think you should take age out of the paper. If it makes it clear that you're not 'young'. The magic of being an author is...you can be a woman, a man, a boy, a child, and...the reader can't tell. An author is sexless and identity-less. Leave it that way. They don't need to know how old you are, or what you look like, that's not germaine to the story? Let them take the story, as is, and then be surprised that someone so positively ancient could be that cool and in touch or something.;)

K.

[ahunter3]

I'm not thrilled with the new title EITHER! Rather than respond to each person's individual comment on the title change, I'm going to respond to my own posting as a way to respond in a collective way to the collective opinion that it's not a very good book title.

Taking age out of the paper isn't really a workable option. The story is of its own era, and although not being "young" may add a burden when it comes to finding an agent / publisher, the fact that I was doing and saying these things in 1980 makes me a pioneer of sorts and to the right agent / publisher that could add to its appeal.

[ahunter3]

I myself don't like the new title as much as the old one. Hard to put my finger on exactly why, but in the old title, the subtitle somehow added clarification without competing with the main title for attention. In the new version, the subtitle doesn't explain much more and it's... intrusive somehow.

What if I inverted it? FROM A QUEERLY DIFFERENT CLOSET: THE STORY OF Q

I'm open to suggestions!

I do still like the "STORY OF Q" part. And it still works: the old acronym LGBT (and the even older less inclusive ones GLB / LGB) was modified to extend the "umbrella", but in a somewhat vaguely defined way, to "Q", concerning which there isn't even consensus on what word the Q stands for (queer? genderqueer [avoiding a second G by shortening it]? questioning? something quintessentially different?), which sets the stage for a "story of". (And of course the play-on-titles reference to STORY OF O).

[khall]

I like the story of q part. It does sound better reversed. Not 100% in love with it, but it's better.

I still think you can...de-emphasize age. When I read mafia stories from the 1940s, I know the people are 1200 years old, now. But...they're youths in the story and...so you, subconsciously, imagine the author (if it is a biography at least) as whatever age the character is...

K.

[old_cutter_john]

Switching the title around makes for an improvement. Suggestions are a bit beyond my abilities: I'm just a brain in a bell jar.