When a writer gets her book title just right, the book explodes fully formed into the universe, a block-buster, a goddess, a movie, a video game. But get it wrong, grasshopper, and the book limps along like a heartbroken troll. Right? Well, maybe…

The boring reality is that titles are a publisher’s purview. A first-time author rarely has more than token control of anything in the publishing process, much less the title.

We were a little bit lucky. Our publisher involved us not only in editing and the cover art, but also kept our original title. Midnight Ink – you rock (although we’d appreciate a bigger, um, well, actually, any advance next time).

How did we come up with this title? Ah, I remember it well…a crisp fall day in our nation’s capital. Clark and I exploring the back room stacks, ordering up dusky books about ancient vampires and reading yellowed pages about American western history at the best-place-in-the-world: the U.S. Library of Congress.

There, right on my assigned reading desk, was a antique novel; hard back, blue with gold-leafed tinged pages, non-descript in that charming 19^th century way, just the right size to fit safely into woolen overcoat or poplin apron pocket. Someone had left it behind. I casually picked it up. The title: “A Very Unusual Romance.”

Pop!

I found Clark deep in the Library’s shelves in the basement – immersed, orgasmic, his wild brain momentarily soothed by centuries of writing and writers.

“I got it,” I said.

He put his finger to his mouth, shushing me, “It’s a holy place,” he whispered.

I hate being shushed but I elected to ignore it, this time anyway.

“The Cowboy and the Vampire: A Very Unusual Romance,” I whispered back.

He thought, he nodded and it was done. When you know, you know.  Writing with a partner, as I have said before, mimics love. You know stuff instinctively.

The book was first published in 1999 with this title (see the image). Those copies are pretty rare to come by now, and we hope for those of you who have one, it will creep up in value, help you retire, or a take a sweet Maui vacation.  I saw one for sale recently for $68.00 (give it time!) but I also saw one for a penny. Rare book market fluctuations are unfathomable to me.

When I look back now, more than ten years on, I think I know why that original title so quickly resonated with everyone involved. We were different writers trying to find a way to work together. The simplicity of the title – two lovely nouns joined by a modest conjunction layered all over our joint creation, all beautiful 161,000 words of it, just popped.

Today, ten years later, the opposite is happening with the sequel. We were screwing around making a ridiculous video called A Writer’s Wretched Life in our kitchen, creating an elaborate back-story for the new book. As we pondered the nature of a slinky cowboy-vampire hybrid being, we wondered about it’s favorite cocktail, what would it drink? Clark mixed blood with whiskey and drank it.

Pop!

Blood and Whiskey is the name of the sequel (pending our publisher’s input of course). After a decade, does the title reflect an, ahem, mature relationship and a burgeoning writing partnership that is well mixed, stiffly stirred, and fully shaken?

In 1999, it was new romance and a virginal writing partnership. Now it is, well, we will find out as we write this sequel. Stay tuned. But we did find out that blood and whiskey make a surprisingly good cocktail.

Sequel word count meter: 14,906.

P.S. It was really tomato juice and iced tea.aracer