No, it's probably the titles.
Nov. 3rd, 2008 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
squeequegSomething frivolous to distract you from the election: I require title advice!
I've got a goofy-ass steampunk-clockwork-Victoriana-dirigible short story that I'm really happy with. I'm currently in the last stages of revising it before I send it out. However, I've discovered that the title I chose on a whim -- "Escapement" -- is the same as the title of a Jay Lake novel that came out earlier this year. I haven't read this book, although I probably ought to, and I'm a little worried that my story will come off as an attempt to ride its coattails.
Should I change the title? I'm not particularly attached to it, although it did sound cool and had some nice resonances within the story. And the Lake novel is well-known (and critically acclaimed) enough that I don't want this light, silly story to stand in its shadow. (To give you an idea of just how serious the story is, the original working title was "Serpents upon a Dirigible.")
I'm a little torn. I love this story, and I want it to have a good chance out there in the big scary world. Any advice?
And now I'm going back to refreshing fivethirtyeight.com every ten minutes and gnawing my nails.
I've got a goofy-ass steampunk-clockwork-Victoriana-dirigible short story that I'm really happy with. I'm currently in the last stages of revising it before I send it out. However, I've discovered that the title I chose on a whim -- "Escapement" -- is the same as the title of a Jay Lake novel that came out earlier this year. I haven't read this book, although I probably ought to, and I'm a little worried that my story will come off as an attempt to ride its coattails.
Should I change the title? I'm not particularly attached to it, although it did sound cool and had some nice resonances within the story. And the Lake novel is well-known (and critically acclaimed) enough that I don't want this light, silly story to stand in its shadow. (To give you an idea of just how serious the story is, the original working title was "Serpents upon a Dirigible.")
I'm a little torn. I love this story, and I want it to have a good chance out there in the big scary world. Any advice?
And now I'm going back to refreshing fivethirtyeight.com every ten minutes and gnawing my nails.
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no subject
Date: 2008-11-03 05:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 02:06 am (UTC)From the unrevised version:
We discovered the serpent's corpse just before reaching the first gun emplacement, ten thousand feet higher than we should have been and at least a day out of our chosen path. The captain grumbled, but after the mate had a word in her ear, she agreed to let us send up a dinghy.
The serpent had crashed halfway up one of the snowcapped peaks that made all nearby terrain but the Sterling Pass impassable, and had only been revealed by the spring thaw. "Thaw, my aunt's drawers," Colonel Dieterich muttered as we disembarked from the gently bobbing jolly-boat. "It's cold enough to freeze a thaumaturge's tits off."
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and, later:
"Good God, Lundqvist, what happened? Are you quite done molesting my batman?"
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Not sure if those are quite representative, but I like 'em.