what do you do when you write the title of a book in an essay

How To Write Book Titles The Proper Way: A Complete Guide For Writers

• February 10, 2022

Book titles within essays or papers can be tricky. There are specific rules that are given for how to include a book title in a way that sets it apart from the content of your writing given by the Modern Language Association. However, as with many other things in life, there are exceptions to the rules. This article will guide you through the rules of the writing style guides so that you can include a book’s title in your paper or essay correctly.

How to write book titles:

Style guides and book titles.

When it comes to book titles within text, there are a few different style guides that have rules you can follow, depending on your writing type. The three types that you will encounter most often are; MLA style, Chicago manual of style, and APA. A writing instructor will usually tell you what style guide you are expected to use for a particular essay or paper.

MLA Style Guide

The MLA handbook states that you should always italicize book titles when styling book titles within your text. The exception to this rule are religious texts. You would not italicize the Holy Bible or the sacred books or titles of other religions. Note the following example.

Pam had stayed most of the summer indoors, re-reading her favorite book series. She was already up to  Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone , and she didn’t regret not being more active or going outside.

In the above example, the book title is italicized. Fiction titles and nonfiction titles alike must be in italics when within the text.

Series Titles in MLA

In the above example, a book from a series was used. But what if the text had not specified which book from the series Pam was reading? Would it still need to be in italics? The answer is: in this case, yes. In other cases, sometimes.

It’s really not as confusing as it seems. When you are talking about a book series but don’t want or need to include the complete series titles for the purposes of your work, you only have to put words in italics that also appear in the book titles. So, because  Harry Potter  is part of the title of all of the books in the series, you would italicize his name every time you mention the book.

However, if you were talking about Katniss Everdeen, you would not have to do this, as the book series she is featured in doesn’t use her name in the titles of  The Hunger Games  series. The same would be true of books like the Nancy Drew books.

Quotation Marks

There are instances in which titles should be placed inside of quotation marks within a paper or essay. This is done when you cite the titles of poems , a chapter title, short stories, articles, or blogs.

So, for example, if you were to write a paper that featured a poem from a book, you would put the book title in italics and the poems cited in quotation marks.

An example of an enduring love poem is “Annabel Lee” from  The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. 

Chapter Title

Another time that quotation marks should be used is when using the title of a chapter. If you are citing a specific chapter of a book, you would enclose the title of the chapter in quotation marks, and the title of the book should be in italics.

The desperation and sadness of a man on death row can be seen in the “Wild Wind Blowing” chapter of Norman Mailer’s  The Executioner’s Song. 

Short Stories

Short stories are another case. Much like the title of a chapter or poem, in which the title is placed in quotation marks, while the title of the book or collection it is found in is italics. The same can be said for sections, stories, or chapters cited within a literary journal.

Stepping away from his norm of horror and gore, Stephen King writes of trust, love, and regret in his story “The Last Rung on the Ladder,” which can be found in his short story collection  Night Shift. 

Punctuation Marks

If you are citing a story or title that includes question marks, you need to make sure to italicize the question mark when citing. Keep all punctuation, such as a question mark, comma, ellipses, colon, or exclamation mark, as it is in the original individual books.

If you want a funny and irreverent read, you’ve got to try  Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea.  Chelsea Handler has done a phenomenal job of being vulgar, relatable, and explaining life from her viewpoint in this hilarious and memorable book.

The Digital Age: Are Book Titles Underlined Anymore?

MLA style used to dictate that a book title should either be in italics or underlined. However, that is no longer the case. As computers started to take over as the major tool used in writing, it became unpopular to underline book titles. Therefore, this rule was dropped from the style guides.

However, it should be mentioned that when handwriting an essay or research paper, many instructors prefer that you underline book titles, as it’s relatively difficult to handwrite italics. If you are in a writing course or a class that is heavy on handwritten work, be sure to ask your instructor or teacher which method they prefer for citing a book title.

How to Come Up with Book Title Ideas

Now that quotation marks, italics, and style guides have been discussed, let’s move on to how you can come up with your own book title. If you’d like a title for your book that sounds interesting and will get a reader’s attention, you may find this article helpful.

Coming up with a good title for your book is a challenging yet essential marketing decision . The right title can make your target audience choose your new book off of the shelf instead of another writer’s work. Your book cover and your book title are quite possibly the most important marketing decisions you will make.

How to Choose a Good Book Title

Certain criteria should be met if you want to have a good book title , and there are specific steps involved in getting there. You may have assumed up until now that titles of books were just spur of the moment decisions made by authors or publishers, but a lot of work goes into writing good titles.

Grab the Reader’s Attention

As a general rule, you want your reader to remember your title and to sound interesting, even without the reader having seen the cover. There are several ways to do this. You can be a little dark with your title, be controversial, provoke the reader, or even be funny.

There are many examples of such works that use memorable and attention-seeking titles. The following are some different titles that are effective and would most likely provoke a reader to grab them from a shelf for closer inspection.

• Burn After Writing (Sharon Jones)
• Love in the Time of Cholera (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
• Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (Mindy Kaling)
• Are You There, Vodka? It’s Me, Chelsea (Chelsea Handler)
• The Devil Wears Prada (Lauren Weisberger)
• Chicken Soup for the Soul (various authors)
• God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian (Kurt Vonnegut)

Shorter Titles

If your full title for your book is long, you may end up boring a reader or creating a situation where a reader tries to remember the title of your book, but it’s too long and ends up getting it confused with another book. Although you should always do your best to make sure that there aren’t books by other authors that share a title or have a title similar to your book (more on that in a minute), you don’t want a person to get confused and get the wrong book instead.

Research Your Title Ideas

It’s a good idea to take the titles you have considered for your book and make a list. Then, do your homework. You can use tools like Google Adwords to test out your title to see if there are others like it, or you can simply use any search engine and plug your title ideas into the search bar and see what similar or exact titles of the same words pop up.

Readers are generally busy people. They don’t have the time or the energy to ensure that writers get a title right. They’ll look for the book they are interested in, and if it proves to be too difficult, or if there are other books written that have the same title, they’ll move on to something else.

A writer really has to make sure that they have a title that isn’t going to be ignored, is interesting, isn’t too long, and isn’t too similar to other works.

The same goes for titles of short works within a larger body of work. Short works, like poems or stories, need to have unique titles as well when included in a larger body of work, such as a collection. If stories are similar in nature, be sure to title them differently so that readers will be able to tell them apart, as well.

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How to Write Book Titles in Your Essays

3-minute read

• 26th May 2023

When writing an essay, you’re likely to mention other authors’ works, such as books, papers, and articles. Formatting the titles of these works usually involves using quotation marks or italics.

So how do you write a book title in an essay? Most style guides have a standard for this – be sure to check that first. If you’re unsure, though, check out our guide below.

Italics or Quotation Marks?

As a general rule, you should set titles of longer works in italics , and titles of shorter works go in quotation marks . Longer works include books, journals, TV shows, albums, plays, etc. Here’s an example of a book mention:

Shorter works include poems, articles, chapters of books, episodes of TV shows, songs, etc. If it’s a piece that’s part of a biggHow to Write Book Titles in Your Essayser work, the piece considered a short work:

Exceptions to the Rule

The rule for writing book titles in italics applies specifically to running text . If the book title is standing on its own, as in a heading, there’s no need to italicize it.

Additionally, if the book is part of a larger series and you’re mentioning both the title of the series and that of the individual book, you can consider the book a shorter work. You would set the title of the series in italics and place the book title in quotation marks:

Punctuation in Book Titles

Do you need to apply italics to the punctuation in a book title? The short answer is yes – but only if the punctuation is part of the title:

If the punctuation isn’t part of the title (i.e., the punctuation is part of the sentence containing the title), you shouldn’t include in the italics:

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Summary: Writing Book Titles in Essays

We hope you’ll now feel confident when you’re writing and formatting book titles in your essays. Generally, you should set the title in italics when it’s in running text. Remember, though, to check your style guide. While the standards we’ve covered are the most common, some style guides have different requirements.

And once you finish writing your paper, make sure you send it our way! We’ll make sure any titles are formatted correctly as well as checking your work for grammar, spelling, punctuation, referencing, and more. Submit a free sample to try our service today.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you write the title of a book in a sentence.

Set the title of the book in italics unless the book is part of a larger work (e.g., a book that’s part of a series):

When do you use quotation marks for titles?

Place titles of shorter works or pieces that are contained in a larger work in quotation marks:

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How to Write a Book Name in an Essay

Last Updated: February 14, 2024 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Noah Taxis and by wikiHow staff writer, Danielle Blinka, MA, MPA . Noah Taxis is an English Teacher based in San Francisco, California. He has taught as a credentialed teacher for over four years: first at Mountain View High School as a 9th- and 11th-grade English Teacher, then at UISA (Ukiah Independent Study Academy) as a Middle School Independent Study Teacher. He is now a high school English teacher at St. Ignatius College Preparatory School in San Francisco. He received an MA in Secondary Education and Teaching from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education. He also received an MA in Comparative and World Literature from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a BA in International Literary & Visual Studies and English from Tufts University. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 62,165 times.

When you’re writing an essay that includes a book title, it can be confusing to write the title correctly. However, it’s really easy once you know the rules. How you write the title will vary a little bit depending on the style your instructor assigns and if you are typing or handwriting the essay. Luckily, it's easy to follow the rules for writing a book name in an essay.

Writing Help

Typing an Essay in MLA or Chicago Style Format

• For example, you would write To Kill a Mockingbird , The Lord of the Rings , or Wuthering Heights .

• If you have the book name in front of you, you can just copy it down as it is printed.
• Articles include a, an, and the.
• Prepositions include at, in, on, of, about, since, from, for, until, during, over, above, under, underneath, below, beneath, near, by, next to, between, among, and opposite.
• Coordinating conjunctions include the FANBOYS, which are for, and, not, but, or, yet, and

• For example, you would write the name of William Faulkner’s novel Absalom, Absalom! with both the comma and the exclamation point in italics.

• If the highlight bar goes away, try again, making sure that you don’t click anywhere on the page after you highlight the book name.

• Alternatively, you can press the italicize icon before you type the title.
• If you’re using Microsoft Word to type your essay, the italicize key may appear if you hover over the highlighted book name.

• If the next word after your title appears italicized when you resume typing, simply highlight it and click the italicize icon to remove the formatting.

• For example, The Lord of the Rings trilogy is sometimes published in one volume. In this case, you could write the name of the first novel as "The Fellowship of the Ring" when citing it in an essay.

Typing an Essay in APA Format

• Capitalize the first letter of the words, not the entire word.
• If the word is a two-part hyphenated word in the title, you should capitalize both words. For example, you would write Blue River: The Trial of a Mayor-Elect .
• If there is a dash or colon in the title, you should capitalize the word after the punctuation, regardless of how long the word is. As above, you would write Blue River: The Trial of a Mayor-Elect .

• For example, you would write Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? with the question mark italicized.

• If the book name is not highlighted, left click and drag your cursor again, making sure that you don’t click again anywhere on the page.

• If you are using Microsoft Word, the italics icon may appear when you hover over the highlighted book title. It’s okay to click this key.

Handwriting an Essay

• For MLA and Chicago style essays, capitalize the first word of the book name and every word other than articles, prepositions, or coordinating conjunctions. For example, write The Lord of the Rings .
• If you’re using APA style, capitalize the first word and all words longer than 4 letters. [9] X Research source This means you would write Public Policy in Local Government .

• If you’re writing on lined paper, it may help to follow along the line of the paper. However, make sure your line is dark enough so that your instructor will see that you properly underlined the book name.

• For example, you would write Judy Blume’s Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret by underlining the punctuation marks as well as the words.

Expert Interview

Thanks for reading our article! If you’d like to learn more about academic writing, check out our in-depth interview with Noah Taxis .

• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_general_format.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/subject_specific_writing/writing_in_literature/writing_about_literature/formatting.html
• ↑ https://www.grammarly.com/blog/underline-or-italicize-book-titles/
• ↑ https://askus.library.wwu.edu/faq/116757
• ↑ https://libguides.up.edu/apa/books_ebooks
• ↑ https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/italics-quotations/italics

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How to Write Book Titles in Essays: APA, MLA, Chicago Styles

It’s your practical and up-to-point guide on how to write a book title in an essay. You’ll get the formatting rules and examples for citing book and author names in academic papers.

We’ve covered the top three citation styles: APA, Chicago, and MLA.

How to Write the Title of a Book in an Essay

First, remember the general rules of citing book names in academic works.

Here’s how to cite books in essays :

• Use capitalization. Every word of a book’s name goes in the title case, except prepositions, articles, and coordinating conjunctions.
• Use italics for longer and independent works. Use double quotations for shorter ones (poems, articles, book chapters, or play acts and scenes).
• Use single quotations for a book’s title within another title. (When citing monographs about literary works, for example.) 

While capitalization rules depend on the citation style, some general tips have a place to be. Please, no capitalization for:

• Articles: a, the (unless the book title begins with it)
• Coordinating conjunctions and prepositions: of, and, or, but, for, to, nor, in, so (unless the book title begins or ends with it)

Subordinating conjunctions (although, unless, because, if) go in capital letters.

How to Write a Book Title in an Essay: APA

APA (American Psychological Association) is the most popular style for citing academic works. It’s common for the social sciences like Education, Psychology, Sociology, and others. The current edition: 7th (2019).

Book titles in APA stand for:

• Italics. (If a book name includes any punctuation, italicize it too.)
• Capitalization. (Capitalize all words longer than four letters , regardless of the part of speech. Also, use capital letters for two-part words and those coming after a dash or a colon.)
• Double quotations instead of italics. (When citing a short work like an article or a poem; when citing a book chapter or when the book is a part of an anthology.)

For example: 

The Lord of the Rings but “The Fellowship of the Ring” (The latter is part of the trilogy.)

Related: How to Cite a Movie in APA Format

How to Write the Name of a Book in an Essay: Chicago

The Chicago Manual of Style is a guide by the University of Chicago. It’s common for fields like History, Fine Arts, and Business. The current edition: 17th (2017).

How to format book titles in Chicago:

• Italicize longer and independent works; put shorter ones in double quotations.
• Use italics for punctuation within a title.
• Capitalize all words except articles (a, the) and ALL prepositions or conjunctions (regardless of length).

For example:

In George Orwell’s 1984 , the author presents a dystopian society characterized by pervasive government surveillance and the suppression of individual freedom. The harrowing events in “Chapter 2,” where Winston Smith begins to rebel against the Party by starting a forbidden diary, mark a pivotal moment in the novel’s exploration of resistance against totalitarianism.

The style resembles the MLA format, but it’s flexible, allowing you to “break the rules if necessary.”

How to Write a Book Title in an Essay: MLA

MLA format stands for the Modern Language Association. It’s common for humanities like Literature, Culture, Linguistics, etc. The current edition: 8th (2016). 

How to format books in MLA:

• Italicize all words, including punctuation and those of two parts or going after colons and hyphens.
• Capitalize all words except articles (a, the) , prepositions, and short conjunctions within a book title.
• Use double quotations instead of italics when writing a book chapter or a part of a book series.

In Little Women , Beth March dies in Chapter 40, “The Valley of the Shadow.”

Formatting Book Author Names in Papers

Use the author’s full name (first and last) to format it in your essay for proper credit.

If a book has two authors, use both last names and initials. For works with three or more authors, use the last name of the first one and add “et all.”

No need to italicize author names in papers.

Why Properly Cite Book Titles in Essays

The short answer:

You won’t get a high grade for an essay. Formatting blunders count as mistakes.

The longer answer:

• You prove writing skills and an understanding of the rules in academia.
• Your papers maintain consistency. It’s critical to stick to criteria to prevent confusion. The consistent format for book headings also serves to better scannability and readability.
• You learn to cite different types of references for your future projects.

Do you italicize book titles?

Yes, you put book titles in italics. Please italicize long and stand-alone works: books, movies, webpages, reports, or music albums. Shorter works’ titles (articles, essays, poems, songs, or book chapters) come in quotations. (1)

Do you underline book titles?

Underlining book titles is an outdated practice. Some still use it in handwritten essays, but it’s not a must-follow rule. Neither APA nor MLA (or Chicago) mentions underlining book names in academic papers.

How to use book title capitalization in texts?

Capitalize every word in a book’s title. Exceptions are articles (a, the), prepositions, and short (three or fewer letters) conjunctions in mid-titles.

Are books italicized in all formatting styles?

Yes, book titles come in italics in all styles: APA, MLA, and Chicago. When citing book chapters or a book as a part of a series, use quotation marks instead.

How to write a book author in an essay?

Use the author’s full name when citing their book in your papers. For works with several authors, mention their last names and initials. Unlike book titles, author names come in standard formatting with no italics.

References:

• https://english.csuci.edu/resources/essay-writing-essentials.htm
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Writing A Book Title In Your Essay – The Right Way

Table of contents

• 1 APA Style: How to Write Book Titles in Essays
• 2 APA Style Essay: Writing The Name of The Author
• 3 MLA Style Essay: Citing a Book Title
• 4 Chicago Style Essay: Writing the Book Title
• 5 Writing Various Types of Titles
• 6 Should We Underline or Italicize Book Titles?

When you are writing an academic essay , the book title and author’s name should be written in italics. However, if the book title is part of a larger work (such as a journal article), it should be underlined instead. So, you’re wondering how to write a book title in an essay?

Writing an essay with a book title can be tricky, particularly because each style guide has its own formatting rules for including titles in the main text. Whether you are using MLA, APA, Chicago, or Harvard referencing styles, you will need to consider how to properly format the book title. For more complicated literature-based assignments, seeking assistance from an admission essay writing service may be wise, as they specialize in writing essays that incorporate academic sources.

In this article, we will explore how to write both titles in an essay properly so that you avoid any mistakes!

APA Style: How to Write Book Titles in Essays

When writing an essay, you must follow the style guide provided by your professor. Some teachers may require you to use APA style and others MLA style. There are some rules on how to quote a book title in an essay. You should use italics and quotation marks when writing book titles in essays. For example: “ The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II. “

When writing a book title in APA Style , you should be aware of these rules:

Write the book title in italics and place it after the author’s name, which is presented in reverse order (last name first).

Use quotation marks around the headline of a chapter or article.

Capitalize proper names that are not common nouns (names of people, places, organizations), but do not capitalize words such as “and,” “or,” “to,” or “and/or.”

Do not capitalize prepositions that appear at the beginning of titles if they are followed by an article (e.g., “A,” “An”), but do capitalize prepositions at the beginning of titles if they are not followed by articles (“Of”).

The first word of the headline should be capitalized, as well as any other words after a colon or hyphen. For example, “The Elements of Style: Grammar for Everyone”  or “Theories of Personality: Critical Perspectives.”

Capitalize proper names and words derived from them (e.g., the names of people, places, organizations), except proper nouns used generically (e.g., ‘a bed’).

APA Style Essay: Writing The Name of The Author

You should always use the full name and surname of the author in your APA essay because this will give proper credit to the writer. If you do not mention the author’s full name, people may not know who wrote what and will think you copied it from somewhere else. This will cause lots of problems for you and your reputation as well.

Make sure that all authors’ names appear in the same format in each entry. For example, if one person’s surname is Smith and another’s is Jones, both have first names starting with “J.” It may seem like they are being cited as different people when they’re actually written differently from each other on separate pages in your paper.

To write an APA essay without any issues, there are certain rules that you need to follow while writing an author’s name in APA essay:

• Use only one author’s name in your paper unless there are multiple authors
• If there are multiple authors, then use both their last names followed by the initials of their first names
• Only use initials of first names when there are three or more authors; otherwise, use full names with their last names

Example: Johnson, M.C., Carlson, M., Smith, J. N., & Hanover, L. E.

MLA Style Essay: Citing a Book Title

Now let’s discuss how to mention a book in an essay. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 7th edition, published by the Modern Language Association (2014), contains detailed rules about how to cite a book title in an essay.

The following guidelines will instruct you on how to refer to a book in an essay in MLA style :

• List your sources at the end of your paper, before the works cited page or bibliography.
• Use italics for titles of books, magazines, and newspapers, but not for articles within those publications, which should be placed in quotation marks.
• Include all relevant book information under two categories: “title” and “author.” In the former category, include the work’s title and its subtitle if there is one; do this even if neither appears on your title page (see below). In the latter category, include only primary authors who have written or edited an entire book; if there are multiple contributors, you should cite them separately under each.

The general format for citing the title of the book in an essay is as follows:

Author’s last name, first initial (Date). Title of Book with Subtitle if there is one. Publisher Name/Location of Publisher; Year Published

Chicago Style Essay: Writing the Book Title

One of the most important things to remember when writing in Chicago style is how to write the title of a book in an essay. To write a good book title in an essay, you should follow these steps:

• Write it at the beginning of your sentence.
• Capitalize it just like any other noun or proper noun.
• Put a comma after the title unless it’s an introductory clause or phrase. For example: “The Firm,” by John Grisham (not “by”) and “The Catcher in the Rye,” by J.D Salinger (not “and”).
• In addition to the book’s name, punctuation marks should also be italicized.

For example: Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince: Children’s Edition

Writing Various Types of Titles

Now that we covered how to write a book title and author in an essay, it’s time to look at some different types of titles. When you write a book title in an essay, several things must be considered. Whether it’s a book, series, chapter title, editor’s name, or author’s name, how you write it depends on where it appears in your paper.

Here are some key rules for writing headings for novels:

•  Use capital letters to write the title of the novel. For example,  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett .
• Use italics and capital letters to write the name of the author and his/her other works mentioned in a book title—for example,  Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813) .

You should use quotation marks when writing headings of short title poems, articles, and stories.

However, before deciding which format to use, it is important to understand the main idea you want to express in your essay. Additionally, you could use essay papers for sale to help you accomplish your goal of writing an essay effectively.

Should We Underline or Italicize Book Titles?

It depends on which style guide you use. The Modern Language Association and Chicago Manual of Style both suggest using italics, while the American Psychological Association suggests using quotation marks with a few exceptions.

The way you write the title of a book in an essay is different depending on the instructions you were given. For example, if you’re writing an essay in APA style, use quotation marks around the book’s name. If you’re writing for MLA or Chicago style , however, italicize the book’s name instead. If you’re writing a handwritten essay instead of using a computer, capitalize and underline the book’s name.

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How to Write A BOOK Title In An Essay

Writing a book title in an essay can be confusing. But it is necessary for the credibility and clarity of the write-up. Plus, each writing style has its own rules for formatting titles. Hence, doing such an activity could be a real pain for the students.

Don’t worry, as you are in the right place! Since this interesting article focuses on guiding you about how to write a book title in an essay accurately. So, read it thoroughly before you search for a professional  paper writing services  provider.

Table of Contents

Understanding Formatting Guidelines

The first step in learning how to write book name in essay is to learn the basics. It means you need to get comfortable with different formatting guidelines. Let’s begin with the style guides.

Different style guides

When writing essays for college , it’s important to know the rules for formatting book titles. The three most popular style guides are MLA, APA, and Chicago.

In  MLA format , you should usually italicize book titles. You can also put them in quotation marks when a type of work demands.

For example, a book title like “To Kill a Mockingbird” would be italicized:  To Kill a Mockingbird .

However, a chapter title within a book would be placed within quotation marks. For example, “The Ewell Family.”

In  APA style , the first word of book titles is capital.

For example, a book title like “The Catcher in the Rye” would be written as The catcher in the rye

Chicago Style

Chicago style demands a book title to be in italics or quotation marks. It is very similar to the MLA style. But Chicago style gives you a bit more leeway to use italics or quotation marks. It’s best to stay consistent with what you pick throughout your essay when using the Chicago style.

Consistency within the Essay

You must be consistent when including the title of a book in an essay. Figure out what style guide you must follow and ensure you stick with it. That means all the book titles you mention should look the same.

For example, if you choose to italicize book titles according to MLA style. Ensure that all book titles in your essay are italicized consistently. Avoid mixing italicization with quotation marks or using different formatting styles within the same essay.

Inconsistency in formatting can confuse readers and undermine the professionalism of your work. Paying attention to detail and maintaining consistency will contribute to your essay’s overall clarity and readability.

Determine the Appropriate Style Guide to Follow

To determine the appropriate style guide to follow for formatting book titles in your essay, consider the following:

Assignment Requirements

See if your teacher or the instructions for the assignment mention a certain style to go by. Stick to that, if they do, to ensure everything is consistent, and you meet the expectations.

Academic Discipline

Your field of study can affect which style guide you should use. For example, humanities and literature students usually use MLA style, while social sciences usually use APA style. It’s important to know what’s typical in your discipline to choose the right guide.

Formatting Book Titles in MLA Style

Humanities and liberal arts disciplines use MLA writing rules. In MLA style, book titles are usually in italics like in APA style. But there can be variations in capitalization and punctuation. Let’s explore each aspect in detail with examples:

In MLA style, book titles are put in italics to make them stand out from the rest of the text.

Titles of shorter works, such as articles or chapters, are enclosed in quotation marks.

Example 1: Italicized Book Title

Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby .

Example 2: Book Chapter (In Quotation Marks)

Smith, John. “The Art of Persuasion.” Essays on Rhetoric.

Capitalization

In MLA style, follows the title case. It means keep the first letter of each word capital. Capitalize articles, conjunctions, and prepositions only if they are the first or last words in title.

Example 3: Correct Capitalization

Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird.

Punctuation

In MLA style, there should be no special punctuation like colons or periods between the main title and any subtitles. However, if the book’s title includes a subtitle, a colon should separate it from the main title.

Example 4: Book Title with Subtitle

Gladwell, Malcolm. Outliers: The Story of Success.

Edition and Volume Numbers

To refer to a certain book edition, add the edition number after the book title. If the book is part of a multi-volume work, indicate the volume number after the title as well.

Example 5: Edition and Volume Numbers

Johnson, Mary. Chemistry in Focus. 2nd ed.

Smith, Adam. The Wealth of Nations. Vol. 1.

Translated Titles

If the book you are citing is translated from another language, include the original title and the translator’s name in the citation.

Example 6: Translated Title

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Translated by David Wyllie.

It’s important to remember that MLA style is always changing and being updated. So always refer to the latest edition of the MLA Handbook or your institution’s writing guidelines.

Formatting Book Titles in APA Style

Usually the social sciences disciplines use APA (American Psychological Association) style. Let’s look at how you must consider capitalization, punctuation and italics in this writing style.

Just capitalize the first word of any subtitles and proper nouns.

All other words, such as articles (a, an, the), conjunctions (and, but, or), and prepositions (in, on, at), are in lowercase.

Example 1: 

“The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business”

In APA style, book titles are italicized to distinguish them from the rest of the text.

Do not italicize titles of shorter works, such as articles or chapters. Just enclose them in quotation marks.

Example 2: Italics

Here’s an example of an italicized book title:

The Catcher in the Rye

In APA style, there should be a colon (:) between the main title and any subtitle.

When citing a book title within the text of your paper, use title case and italicize it.

When including book titles in your reference list, use sentence case and italicize it.

Example 3: Punctuation

Here’s an example of proper punctuation and citation within the text and reference list:

In-text citation

According to Smith (2019),  The Theory of Everything  provides an in-depth analysis of astrophysics.

Reference list citation

Smith, J. (2019).  the theory of everything . Publisher.

Include the edition number in parentheses right after the book title when a book has a specific edition.

If a book is part of a multi-volume work, you can also indicate the volume number after the title.

Example 4: Parenthesis

Here are examples of how to format book titles with edition and volume numbers:

Edition Number

Johnson, M. (2022). Chemistry in Focus (2nd ed.).

Volume Number

Smith, A. (2021). History of the United States (Vol. 3).

Include the translator’s name in square brackets if you cite a translated book. 

Example 5: Translated Thesis 

Here’s an example of how to format a translated book title:

Kundera, M. (1984). The Unbearable Lightness of Being [Original title: Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí].

Translated by M. Henry.

Formatting Book Titles in Chicago Style

The Chicago Manual of Style is mostly used in the humanities and social sciences disciplines. Chicago style follows two systems, namely Author-Date System and the notes and bibliography system. Let’s explore both of them.

Author-Date System

In the author-date system, you include:

• In-text citations with the author’s last name
• The publication year
• A corresponding entry in the reference list

Italicization

In the author-date system, book titles are italicized. It makes them Distinguish from other elements in the citation.

Chicago style uses a title case for book titles in the author-date system. It means the first letter of the title, subtitles, and any major words are capitalized.

There should be a period at the end of the full book citation in the reference list.

Example 1: In-Text Citation

Example 2: Reference List Citation

Smith, John. 2019.  The Theory of Everything . Publisher.

Notes and Bibliography System

You use footnotes or endnotes in the notes and bibliography system for in-text citations and a bibliography for the full list of references.

Similar to the author-date system, book titles are italicized in the notes and bibliography system.

In the notes and bibliography system, the Chicago style uses headline-style capitalization for book titles. It means that the first letter of the first and last words of the title are capitalized.

Put a period at the end of each full bibliographic entry in the notes and bibliography system.

Example 3: Footnote/Endnote Citation

John Smith,  The Theory of Everything  (Publisher, 2019), 25.

Example 4: Bibliography Citation

Smith, John.  The Theory of Everything . Publisher, 2019.

You may include the edition number after the title, and for multi-volume works, the volume number after the title.

Example 5: Edition Number

Johnson, Mary.  Chemistry in Focus . 2nd ed.

Example 6: Volume Number

Smith, Adam.  The Wealth of Nations . Vol. 1.

For translated works, include the original title and the translator’s name in the citation.

Example 7: Translated Title

Kafka, Franz.  The Metamorphosis . Translated by David Wyllie.

Citation of Book Titles in Other Situations

Let’s highlight some unusual circumstances of including a title of book in essay. Starting with:

Book titles within quotations

If you’re citing a direct quote from a book in your essay, you may need to put the book title in quotes. Generally, you should use double quotation marks for this.

For example:

According to Mark Twain, “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”

In the novel 1984, George Orwell explores the theme of government surveillance through the famous line, “Big Brother is watching you.”

By using double quotation marks, you indicate that the words within the quotation marks are taken directly from the book.

Book Titles in Footnotes or Endnotes

In academic writing, footnotes or endnotes can be added to give extra info or credits. When including book titles, how you format them depends on the citation style you’re using.

In Chicago Style, book titles in footnotes or endnotes should usually be italicized or in quotation marks.

For Example:

Jane Austen,  Pride and Prejudice  (New York: Penguin Classics, 2002), 45.

Harper Lee,  To Kill a Mockingbird , (New York: Harper Perennial, 2006), 77.

Handling Foreign language book titles

Follow these rules for citing a book in a foreign language. You should keep the original language title, especially if it’s a popular work.

Italicize the foreign language book title following the same guidelines as you would for an English book title. Include a translation in parentheses if necessary.

Use the original foreign language title in sentence case without italics or quotation marks. Include a translation in brackets if needed.

Italicize or use quotation marks for foreign language book titles, following the same guidelines as you would for an English book title. Include a translation if required.

Special Cases

In certain situations, you might need to format book titles differently. Like if you’re talking about a poem or play. These types of works have their own rules for formatting titles. Let’s get to know them briefly. 

Typically, you’d put poem titles in quotation marks and longer pieces of poetry, like epics, in italics. It’s worth checking the style guide you’re using, though, since the rules can vary.

You’ll usually see the title written in italics when it comes to plays. The names of characters or speakers within the play are usually written with a mix of upper- and lowercase letters, without quotation marks.

Best Practices for Including Book Titles in Essays

Double-check formatting guidelines.

It’s super important to double-check the formatting rules for book titles when writing an essay since each style guide has its own rules. You need to make sure you’re following them properly.

Proofreading for Accuracy and Consistency

Look out for mistakes in how you’ve done the capitals, italics, and quotes. Double-check any extra rules that might apply to foreign language books, poems, plays, and other special cases.

Seek Assistance from Style Guides or Writing Resources

It’s a good idea to get help from style guides or writing tools when you are stuck with citations. You can also buy cheap essay from a well-reputed writing services provider.

It’s super important to get book titles in essays right. Not just for clarity but also to show you’re a pro. Ensure that you stick to the accurate style guide. It could be MLA, APA, or Chicago. Plus, there are special rules for poems and more.

Furthermore, if you need a professional to help you out with citations, do count on the expertise of  our writers . They are always available to get you out of your troubles of how to write book titles in essays.

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Do I Underline the Title of a Book When Writing? Definitive Guide

My name is Debbie, and I am passionate about developing a love for the written word and planting a seed that will grow into a powerful voice that can inspire many.

Underlining Titles: A Comprehensive Guide for Writers

Why underlining titles is important, do’s and don’ts of underlining titles, the role of underlining in book titles: why does it matter, when to underline book titles: a simple rule, exceptions to the underlining rule: special cases unveiled, alternatives to underlining: modern approaches to formatting book titles, avoiding common mistakes: tips for properly formatting book titles, staying consistent: establishing your personal style guide for book titles, frequently asked questions, in conclusion.

As a writer, it is crucial to understand the rules of underlining titles to enhance the readability and professionalism of your work. When titles are underlined, they stand out, making it easier for readers to distinguish them from the surrounding text. Underlining titles also helps in conveying the proper emphasis, ensuring that the intended meaning is clear. Whether you are writing a book, an article, or even an email subject line, mastering the art of underlining titles will make your writing more impactful and professional.

When it comes to underlining titles, there are a few guidelines that every writer should follow. Firstly, it is important to remember that underlining should be used for longer works such as novels, journals, and movies. Titles of shorter works like poems, articles, and short stories should be enclosed in quotation marks instead. Additionally, it is crucial to consistently format titles throughout your writing. Avoid alternating between underlining and italicizing titles, as it can confuse your readers and diminish the overall professionalism of your work. Lastly, make sure to verify the preferred style guide or formatting standards of your specific writing context, as some industries or academic disciplines may have their own preferred conventions for underlining titles.

The role of underlining in book titles is often overlooked, but it plays a crucial role in enhancing the overall reading experience. Underlining serves as a visual cue that differentiates a book title from the rest of the text, allowing readers to easily identify and locate the title. By underlining book titles, authors and publishers give prominence to these important elements, making them more distinguishable and memorable.

Moreover, underlining book titles adheres to a widely accepted style convention that helps maintain consistency in written works. Consistency in formatting is essential as it allows readers to focus on the content without being distracted by inconsistent or confusing visual cues. Underlining also helps to clearly separate book titles from other types of titles, such as article or chapter titles, thereby making it easier for readers to navigate through a text.

• Underlining book titles provides a visual distinction for readers.
• It enhances the overall reading experience by making titles more distinguishable and memorable.
• Underlining adheres to a widely accepted style convention, ensuring consistency in written works.
• It separates book titles from other types of titles, facilitating easier navigation through the text.

Understanding the role of underlining in book titles is crucial for authors, publishers, and readers alike. By employing this formatting technique, books can become more aesthetically pleasing and easier to comprehend. So, next time you pick up a book, pay attention to the underlined title and appreciate the thoughtfulness and purpose behind it.

Have you ever found yourself wondering whether or not to underline book titles in your writing? It’s a common dilemma that many writers face. Fortunately, there is a simple rule that can help you make the right decision. By following this guideline, you can ensure consistency and enhance the readability of your work.

The general rule is to underline book titles when you are writing by hand or using a typewriter. However, with the advent of computers and modern word processors, the standard practice has shifted. Nowadays, it is more common to use italics or quotation marks to indicate the title of a book.

• Use italics: When you are typing on a computer or using any digital platform, italics are the preferred method to indicate book titles. Italicizing the title makes it stand out and helps your readers easily identify it.
• Use quotation marks: Quotation marks are a suitable alternative to italics. If your formatting options do not allow for italicization, using quotation marks to enclose the book title is acceptable. Just ensure consistency throughout your writing.

Remember, consistency is key when it comes to formatting book titles. Whether you choose italics or quotation marks, make sure you stick to the chosen style throughout your document. By following this simple rule, you can effectively highlight book titles in your writing and improve the overall clarity and professionalism of your work.

While underlining text is a popular practice in writing, there are certain situations where this convention does not apply. Here, we unveil some special cases that deviate from the underlining rule, providing you with a deeper understanding of when and why to make exceptions:

• Titles of Books, Articles, and Other Major Works: When citing major works, such as books, articles, or albums, it is customary to italicize rather than underline the titles. This stylistic choice helps to differentiate these significant compositions from surrounding text, making them visually stand out.
• Foreign Words and Phrases: If you find yourself incorporating foreign words or phrases into your writing, it is best to italicize them to distinguish them from the rest of the text. This not only allows the reader to recognize their unique nature but also adds emphasis and clarity to their meaning.
• Web and Digital Content: With the rise of the digital age, the rules of underlining have evolved. In modern web writing, underlining is generally not used for hyperlink formatting. Instead, hyperlinks are typically displayed in a different color or are underlined only when the user hovers over them. This helps readers effortlessly differentiate between regular and linked text, enhancing the overall browsing experience.

By shedding light on these exceptions, we hope to equip you with a greater understanding of when to deviate from the standard underlining rule. Remember, embracing these special cases not only elevates the visual aesthetics of your writing but also enhances readability and clarity for your audience.

In the ever-evolving world of typography and book formatting, underlining has become a rather outdated method of emphasizing book titles. Luckily, there are several modern alternatives that not only enhance the visual appeal of titles but also provide a more engaging reading experience . Here are a few contemporary approaches that are gaining popularity among publishers and designers:

1. **Italics**: Italicizing book titles has become the go-to method for indicating emphasis in the publishing industry. By slanting the text slightly, it creates a subtle visual distinction that grabs the reader’s attention without overpowering the overall design. Moreover, italics offer a more organic and fluid feel to the text, making it easier on the eyes and improving readability.

When it comes to properly formatting book titles, there are a few common mistakes that many people make. By avoiding these errors, you can ensure that your book titles are correctly formatted and reflect professionalism. Here are some helpful tips to keep in mind:

– Capitalization: It’s important to remember that in book titles, major words should be capitalized. This includes nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Articles, prepositions, and conjunctions, on the other hand, should be lowercase unless they are the first or last word of the title. For example, “The Catcher in the Rye” is properly capitalized, whereas “The Catcher In The Rye” would be incorrect. – Italics vs. Quotation Marks: Book titles should always be either italicized or enclosed in quotation marks to indicate that they are titles. Generally, longer works like novels, textbooks, or anthologies are italicized. Shorter works like poems, articles, or short stories are enclosed in quotation marks. For example, “To Kill a Mockingbird” is properly italicized, while “To Kill a Mockingbird” is incorrect.

When it comes to book titles, consistency is key in establishing your personal style guide. A well-defined style guide not only adds a professional touch to your work but also helps create a cohesive brand identity . Here are some tips to help you stay consistent and develop your own personal style guide for book titles:

• Choose a Format: Decide on a consistent format for your book titles. Whether you prefer the use of capitalization, italics, or quotation marks, stick to your chosen style throughout your writing.
• Consider Length: Determine the desired length of your book titles. Short and punchy titles may work well for some genres, while longer and more descriptive titles may suit others. Having a consistent length will give your titles a distinct look and feel.
• Create a Theme: Think about the themes or motifs prevalent in your writing and try to infuse them into your book titles. A thematic approach will help establish a cohesive and recognizable style that resonates with your readers.

Remember that consistency is not about being rigid, but rather about having a clear and discernible style that reflects your writing and engages your audience. By establishing your own personal style guide for book titles, you can enhance your credibility as an author and make a lasting impression on your readers.

Q: Why is it important to know whether I should underline the title of a book when writing? A: Understanding the correct formatting of book titles is crucial as it enhances the professionalism and clarity of your writing. Plus, it ensures that you follow the standard rules and guidelines set by style manuals.

Q: Which titles should be underlined? A: In traditional print media, such as books or magazines, titles of longer works like books, plays, or journals are typically underlined. However, with modern word processors and digital platforms, underlining has been largely replaced by italics.

Q: Can I simply use italics instead of underlining the title? A: Yes, in fact, using italics is the preferred method in modern writing. Italicizing book titles provides emphasis and stands out to the reader more effectively than underlining. This applies to both print and digital platforms.

Q: Are there any exceptions to italicizing book titles? A: Yes, there are a few exceptions where neither underlining nor italics are necessary. Shorter works such as articles, short stories, or individual poems, are typically enclosed in quotation marks.

Q: What if I’m writing by hand or can’t use italics? A: If you are unable to use italics, such as when writing by hand, you may resort to underlining as an alternative. However, if possible, it is advisable to type or use a computer to take advantage of italics for better visual clarity.

Q: How do I format book titles in digital writing, like emails or online articles? A: In digital writing, book titles should be italicized, just like in print. Use quality word processing software, blogging platforms, or content management systems that support italics to ensure proper formatting.

Q: Can I use bold or all capital letters instead of italics for book titles? A: It is generally not recommended to use bold or all capital letters as substitutes for italics when formatting book titles. While they may attract attention, they lack the subtlety and standardized look that italics provide.

Q: Should I italicize the titles of non-English books or works from other languages? A: Yes, the same rules apply for non-English titles. Italicize the titles of books or works, regardless of the language they are written in. Ensure that the italics accurately represent the original characters and symbols.

Q: Is there a specific reference style I should follow when italicizing book titles? A: Yes, specific reference styles, such as the APA (American Psychological Association), MLA (Modern Language Association), or Chicago Manual of Style, dictate the formatting of book titles and citations in different contexts. Familiarize yourself with the appropriate style guide for your writing needs.

Q: Are there any exceptions or special cases where underlining book titles is still acceptable? A: Generally, underlining book titles is considered outdated in modern writing conventions. However, if you encounter a specific style guideline, academic institution, or project that specifically requires underlining, it is essential to follow those guidelines accordingly.

In conclusion, when writing, it is important to remember that book titles should be italicized or put in quotation marks, not underlined.

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Home » Blog » How to Write a Book Title [In 8 Steps]

How to Write a Book Title [In 8 Steps]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

It is important for writers and authors to know how to write a book title. The book title is the first idea someone has about the contents of the book.

Giving your book a good quality and eye-catching title will go a long way in the book selling itself. Crafting the perfect title may be difficult, but it’s always worth it.

There are several steps to take to get it right:

• Consider the genre
• Reference the theme and plot
• Consider the time period
• Research to ensure originality
• Remain flexible as your story evolves
• Consider the characters
• Create several title options
• Get professional opinions and feedback

When learning how to write a novel , you want it to be unique and stand out from the rest. This starts with the title.

Importance of Knowing How to Write a Book Title

Everyone wants to invest their time into something worthwhile. You might think that the title of your book isn’t a big deal, but this is a mistake.

The title is one of the most crucial parts of your book. Think of it as bait. Fishermen use bait to catch more fish. Having a suitable title in place will be good bait for your target audiences. They will be enticed to look because of the interesting title.

Saves Money

Knowing how to write a book title will save you the money you would have paid someone to create it for you. Especially when self-publishing your book, costs can get high. Every little thing you do to keep them down will count.

Helps You Learn

Practice makes perfect, and this includes writing the title of a book. Once you have done it a few times, you will begin to learn what makes a title great. Eventually, you will have an easier time coming up with good ones.

Personalized

Making sure the title is catchy and effective doesn’t mean it has to be generic. You can create something personal and reflective of your own personality. It is your book after all!

Having the title and even the overall look of your book reflect who you are as a writer will help you connect with your audience. You can develop a style that your readers will come to know, expect, and love.

Benefits of Having an Impressive Book Title

Having good content within the book is essential but getting noticed is the first half of the battle. When you walk into a bookstore and there is a sea of books starting back at you, your eye will first go to the titles.

They are usually the most noticeable thing on the cover, and they give you a glimpse into the book itself.

There are several benefits that come with having a good title for your book:

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How to Write a Book Title With a Book Title Generator

If you are ever struggling with the book title, there are many book title generators out there that can help you. Some are simple, while others are quite detailed and complex. Don’t be afraid to utilize these powerful tools, they are there to help.

Even the more complex ones aren’t difficult to use. Some of them require some simple information input. This can be keywords, character names themes, and genre.

A book title generator will then take this information and come up with some titles for you. Some give only one, while others offer many. Others will offer titles based solely on the genre, or even nothing at all.

If you don’t like what they give you, generating more is easy.

While they are a simple concept, A book title generator is a useful tool in the arsenal of any writer. Whether they give you your perfect title or just spark some inspiration, they are helping you.

An example of one of the most popular generators is the Portents Content Idea Generator . This one is simple, fun, and effective.

A well-crafted book title will always be a significant weapon in the hands of an author . It is one of the most effective marketing tools they will use.

It will be a way of allowing your book to stand out and be remembered. Writing a good book title is part of knowing how to write a novel.

The steps for writing a book title:

1. How to Write a Book Title

1. by genre.

The genre will always be an important factor in determining the title of your book.

First of all, fiction and nonfiction titles will look exceedingly different. Nonfiction titles should be specific and to the point, while also being catchy and memorable. Nonfiction titles are usually on the long side, and that’s okay. Most of the time they also include a subtitle with additional information.

The title of a fictional novel should be short, catchy, and reflective of the story in some way. For romance, this might be something light-hearted and sweet. For fantasy, it will probably sound other-worldly and magical.

There aren’t any specific “rules.” In the end, your book’s title is up to you. But, it will be most successful if it makes sense within your chosen genre.

2. Reference the Book’s Theme and Plot

All good books have a central theme and a developed plot. You want your title to play into the these. You want the title to hint at what happens in the book. This gives readers an idea of what to expect.

Your reader shouldn’t be confused about the title after reading a few chapters.

3. Think About the Time Period

Every era had its slang words and popular phrases. If your book takes place at some point in history, do some research on the language that was used back then. Choose some interesting words and see if they will fit into the title.

It is not necessary to use a word or phrase from the time, but it can be a cool and unique addition if it does work. For a reader who knows anything about the time period you are writing in, it will give them additional insight and understanding.

4. Ensure Your Title is Original

This is one way to have a unique title – don’t replicate one that already exists. Even if it was unintentional, it can make you look lazy if readers think you just copied. Spend some time researching to make sure the book title is not already in use.  

It’s not unheard of for book titles to be duplicated. Sometimes, the same title makes sense for multiple books. If the two books with the same title are circulated in different parts of the world, this can be okay.

However, if you think or even hope there is any chance of your book being successful internationally, choose something original and unique.

5. Make it a Working Title  

It’s good to remain flexible with your title. Even once you have come up with something that you like, stay open to changing it.

You never know where the book will take you. In the end, you might find you think of something even better.

6. Consider the Characters

Some writers title the book after the name of the strongest character. If your story is highly character -driven and the main character is the biggest focus, consider using their name as the title.

While it won’t clue readers into the actual plot, it will tell them that this person is what the story is truly about.

It will drive home the importance of this character. If your book is titled after the character, readers will immediately recognize the character once they appear in the story.

This can be strategic when introducing the character. If their name is in the title, you won’t have to do or say anything specific to tell readers that they need to focus on this character.

7. Create Multiple Titles

Come up with a few different titles and rank them in the order you best see fit. Having a few options can help you determine the absolute best choice for your book. The order you placed them in might even change as you progress through the story.

This allows you to remain flexible as you write. You won’t ever feel restrained to the title you have chosen.

Once you have created your list, make sure to keep it in a safe place. This is one instance where good book writing software will come in handy.

Squibler is a fantastic option for anyone looking to write their book in the quickest and efficient way possible. It offers several organization methods, including the ability to take and save notes.

You could write down your titles on an easily misplaced paper list, or save a random, single document on your computer. Or, you can keep your list right inside of Squibler. You can even tag it for easy location later.

8. Get Opinions from Experts

You might have picked a title you think is solid, but it never hurts to hear from those who really know what they’re doing. They can give you opinions on the title you have chosen and offer some advice.

You can also give them a description of the story and ask them to come up with their own titles. You don’t necessarily have to use any of these, but they can help inspire you to create the best one possible.

Getting some guidance from those who have gone before you ‘is never a bad idea. Everything is still up to you in the end, but experience is always valuable.

Quick Tips on How to Write a Book Title

When thinking of how to write a book title, there a few things you can keep in mind to create the best one:

• Be mindful of the word count. Especially for fiction, you want to aim for a short title that is loaded with meaning. Longer ones do work sometimes, but you never want it to be excessive. It will become confusing and awkward with too many words.
• Give the title a double meaning. Enhancing the title without getting wordy is always something to strive for. Let your readers be intrigued by it. Write something that allows them to read different meanings into it. Use of vivid language, lively mood, and contrast can be beneficial here.
• Try to use both verbs and nouns. Make use of actionable verbs, and nouns to be more specific and creative. After choosing your title to try to eliminate the generic words and see how to be more precise. This will add more beauty and intrigue to the title.
• Avoid making your title sound old and boring. Your title should be vibrant. Avoid the use of redundant words. Even if a very simple word might work, try to find a brighter and more interesting alternative.
• Make your title easy to read. Go for a title that will be remembered. Two or three words that are clever and catchy will make a title that is easy and even fun to remember. The words should be easy to understand and pronounce, so people don’t get confused when trying to recall it.

Don’t Discount the Importance of Knowing How to Write a Book Title

There are very few situations where such a small handful of words are so important.   It is one of the most crucial steps when learning how to write a novel.

There are many considerations to take when figuring out how to write a book title, and all of them are important. Writing a good title is more difficult than many think.

Just because a title sounds cool and catchy, doesn’t mean it’s going to work for your book. It needs to be cool, catchy, as well as relevant and effective.

Use these tips in conjunction with our comprehensive list of book title generators , and you’ll have the perfect title in no time.

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• Writing Tips

Formatting Titles in Essays

2-minute read

• 8th May 2018

Handling your own headings is one thing, but how should you write the titles of other works? You need to mark them out somehow, and you have two standard options: italics or quote marks.

This is especially important in academic writing , as you’ll often have to discuss books and papers written by other people. Here, then, are some guidelines you should follow when formatting titles.

When to Use Italics

You can often spot a title from the capitalisation , but we still format titles to distinguish between different types of source. Titles of longer sources, for example, typically use italics:

Here, Kerrang! is italicised because it is the title of a magazine (i.e. a standalone work that is not one part of a larger whole). Other publications and productions that this applies to include:

• Academic journals
• Newspapers and magazines
• Websites and blogs
• Films and TV shows
• Radio programmes
• Plays and other stage shows
• Book-length poems
• Paintings and other works of art
• Music albums

The key here, then, is that italics are used for longer published works .

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When to Use Quote Marks

We use quote marks for the title of anything that doesn’t fit in the list above. Usually, this will be something that is part of a more substantial publication, such as an article from a magazine:

In this case, we see both the magazine title and an article title. Using italics on the former and quote marks on the latter makes it immediately obvious which is which. Other cases where quote marks are required include:

• Chapters from books
• Academic papers and journal articles
• Articles from newspapers and magazines
• Single pages from a website or posts from a blog
• Individual poems and short stories
• Single episodes of a TV series
• Single poems from a collection
• Songs and other short recordings

In this case, the key is that quote marks are used for shorter works . However, quote marks are also used for unpublished works regardless of length (e.g. a draft manuscript or a PhD dissertation).

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Best Tips on How to Title an Essay

How to Make a Good Title for an Essay

The success of an essay heavily depends on its title. This may not come as a surprise given that the essay title is the first aspect to provide the reader with a sneak peek into the text. It piques our interest to read the paper in the first place and gives us a preview of what to expect from the author.

Our research paper writing help prepared a thorough guide on how to title an essay. Here you may find tips and tricks for developing an effective APA or MLA essay title. So, let's dive straight into the article for more exciting details!

Essay Title Format

During your essay writing process, ensure you know the stylistic requirements before beginning an essay. Knowing the format you need to employ is crucial because different style manuals may have varying requirements. Mostly, you could have used an APA or MLA essay title format. Our service, where you can buy essay online , explains these two in more detail below.

Essay Title MLA

If you're required to create an essay title MLA format, check whether your instructor wants you to make a separate cover page. If not, put a heading at the beginning of your work that includes your name, the name of your professor, the course ID, and, lastly, the date.

On the other hand, if you must present a cover page for your essay title MLA, then you need to include the following:

• The name of the college
• The title of your paper
• The subtitle of your paper, if applicable
• Your first and last name
• Your teacher or professor's name
• The class name or course number
• The date the paper is due

The formatting instructions are as follows:

• Double-spaced
• Times New Roman font
• Size 12 font
• Apart from very short terms, each word's initial letter should be capitalized. The initial word, however, must always be uppercase.
• The title page shouldn't include a header with the page numbers.

Essay Title APA

Having discussed the MLA format essay title, let's explore what the APA student title page includes:

• The paper title
• Author names
• Institutional affiliation where the author carried out the study
• Name and number of the course
• Professor name
• Page number

The title of an essay format instructions:

• double-spaced
• 1" margins
• 12-point Times New Roman
• According to APA, your title should be targeted and brief, without unnecessary words or abbreviations

How to Choose a Good Title for an Essay: Important Qualities

Nobody will read a dull headline. Your title should grab your audience's attention and encourage them to read the rest of the work. As it is one of the initial things readers see, having a strong attention grabber is essential when writing an essay from scratch. To fully understand how to come up with a title for essay that is strong and exciting, let's consider a few following factors:

Employ a Catchy Hook - Usually, the title of essay format follows a similar basic structure, especially if they are used for an academic article. The hook serves as a unique component that attracts the reader. It's a captivating statement informing others about the topic of the essay. You can also explore several types of sentences with examples that can help you develop the ideal hook structure.

Consider Topic Keywords - These are essential terms or expressions pertinent to your subject and help your reader understand the focus and body of your article. These focus keywords should serve as a brief, one- to two-word article summary. You can choose some terms from the research topic your instructor gave you, but after your thesis statement is formed, this is where you should hunt for ideas.

Use a Colon - A colon is frequently used in academic titles to separate concepts and sentences. The standard procedure is to place a clever remark or brief quotation before the colon. Although these beginning words offer flavor, they can be overdone. Because of this, some individuals find using the colon to be repugnant. Therefore be careful not to misuse this method.

Ask a Question - To write essay title that is strong, consider asking a question. But, use it with caution because posing a question will make your tone less formal. As long as the question is suitably phrased to meet the subject of your essay, feel free to employ it. Always check to see if the title question still applies to your points in the essay's body. The thesis statement should be appropriately reflected as well.

Find Inspirational Quotes - There is no formula for selecting essay titles from the textual content. You may get playful and choose any quotation, proverb, or catchphrase that applies to your particular publication and works as a title. You may also create a great essay title using well-known expressions or idioms. Doing so will help your readers relate to and feel more comfortable discussing your subject.

Here are other rules for how to create a good title:

• Title every section of writing: In the process of writing, create interesting subheadings to give your paragraphs an identity. Also, they make your text look ordered and clear. 
• The title must bear the theme of the text: choose a title that summarizes the essay. 
• Capitalize all words with certain exceptions: Capitalize the first letter of every word in the title, but do not capitalize pronouns, articles, prepositions, and conjunctions.
• Avoid underlining the title: Since topics come in boldface, underlining it will amount to overemphasis. Some authorities say that if you must underline it, do not bolden it.
• Review the final version of the title: Do not forget to do a quick review of the final version of the title—check for grammar, structure, spelling and so on. Re-read it to determine if the title has given justice to the essay. Confirm if the topic is catchy enough to attract your reader’s attention. 
• When using a colon in your title, follow the rules: Since we are dealing with punctuation rules here, let us talk about the colon – when you have two eye-catching topics, separate them with a colon.

Student’s Guide on How to Come Up with a Title for an Essay

Titling an essay can be easy, but there are a few core principles to be taken into account. The following tips will help you stay on track and avoid any common pitfalls.

Essay Goes First

Never start with a title! If you write it before the rest of the text, it will be based on it, and it should be vice versa. Writing an essay before choosing a heading will give you a clear understanding of what should make sense to the reader. Re-read the finished paper several times to decide on the title. The last thing to create is a title - such strategy will give more time to spend on crafting an essay outline, conducting research, or writing the paper itself.

What are you writing about? What is the style of your paper, and is it an academic essay or a free-form essay like a narrative essay? If the topic of your essay is “Do people who commit heinous crimes deserve the death penalty?” your title should not be humorous; it should be strict and to the point.

If your topic is “Why do people like watching funny cat videos?”, feel free to craft a funny title. Determine the tone of your essay and base your title on it—in consideration with the essay’s topic.

The tone can be:

• Serious - “The implications of global warming”
• Funny - “How cats and dogs love their masters”
• Amiable - “Ways to fight depression”
• Persuasive - “Why positive thinking is a must have skill for every person”
• Informative - “Ten rules for creating a chemical at home”

The main goal of a title is to name its paper. There is no need to tell an entire story in the title, or provide any useless details. Sum up your paper in a few words! Another way to do this is to sum up your thesis statement, as it represents the main idea of your essay. Take your thesis and squeeze it into 3-4 words. Imagine that you are creating a title for your favourite newspaper or a slogan for Coca-Cola.

Don’t use fancy words! Take 2-3 main words (keywords), put them together, and stop wasting your time. Avoid jargon and abbreviations.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is something that can help any student and young writer reap benefits. While working on a title, detect the words related to the central idea of the paper. Type the words into the search field of Google and add the word “quote.” A search engine will show numerous web pages with in-text quotations that could be useful. Select the fragment you like. It is possible to learn how to make a creative title for an essay in this way.

Discover several more tips from experts:

• Never forget the “What,” “Who,” “When,” “How,” “Why,” and “Where” questions (if you start with one of these questions, your title has a chance of getting noticed);
• Come up with an unexpected image not related to the selected topic;
• Sometimes, starting with a lie increases the chances of a title being able to catch an eye;
• Review our catchy essay title examples.

Need Some Help With Your Essay's Title?

Feel free to contact EssayPro and we will provide you with a writing help at a moment’s notice. With the years of essay writing experience, titling becomes second nature, so you no longer need to worry about having a catchy headline on your paper.

Essay Title Examples: Bad vs Good

The strongest essay titles condense lengthy essays into concise statements. When wondering how to make an essay title, think carefully about your stylistic choices and essay format to produce an excellent one. Our dissertation help has provided essay title examples to let you understand the difference between good and bad ones more vividly.

Bad Essay Title Examples

As we discussed how to create an essay title and the specific elements that go into it, you should have a clear idea of how important it is to craft a strong title. In contrast, first, look at weak essay title ideas that can break your paper. This should serve as an example of why your heading should not be like this:

Ex 1: ' How Television Has Changed Our World ' - too vast and not informative

Ex 2: 'The Ara Pacis Augustae' - unclear for those who don't know Latin

Ex 3: 'The Most Poisonous Frog' - does not provide any insight

Ex 4: 'A Brief History of Subcultures and How They Manifest Themselves in a Constantly Changing Socio-Economic Environment' - too long and complicated

Ex 5: 'The Little Mermaid 29 Years Later: Selling a Harmful Sexist Message Through a Naughty Image' - inappropriate language

Good Essay Title Examples

Now that you know what a bad essay title looks like, let's explore good essay title examples as their substitutes. Examine the following essay title format styles that will give you a clear understanding.

Ex 1: ' The Electronic Babysitter: A Social History of Uses of the Television' - gives an exact description of what the essay will be about

Ex 2: ' The Modern Historical Significance of the Ara Pacis Augustae to the City of Rome' - here, the reader can understand what they will be reading about

Ex 3: ' A Deadly Beauty: The Evolution of Skin Coloration and Toxicity of the Poisonous Dart Frog' - clear, informative, and on-point.

Ex 4: 'Reconsidering Counterculture in Contemporary Society' - informative enough and brief

Ex 5: 'The Projection of Gender Stereotypes in The Little Mermaid' - employs appropriate language

Catchy Essay Title Ideas

You now understand that long, complicated headlines do not accurately convey the paper's main idea. Take ample time to consider the word choice before tilting your work. How do you create good essay titles? Think creatively and with common sense. But meanwhile, for your convenience, we compiled title ideas for essays you may use as inspiration.

Persuasive Essay Titles

• Why Receiving College Education is Important: Examining Long-term Benefits
• Face-to-Face Courses Cannot Be Replaced by Online Learning
• An MBA Does Not Ensure Corporate Success.
• Every Company Should Adopt a Green Strategy.
• Energy Drinks Represent a Lucrative Market Segment.
• Aircraft, Excess Weight Charges, Need to be Prohibited.
• Patients' Life Shouldn't be Put to Death by Nurses.
• Google Glasses May Increase the Number of Auto Accidents.
• All of the Conventional Malls Will Soon be Replaced By Online Shopping
• How Do Team-building Exercises Contribute to the Development of Inventions?
• Illegal immigrants are entitled to remain in the US.

Academic Essay Titles

• Several English Dialects: The Link Between Various Cultures
• Instagram: A social media innovation
• Is it possible to reverse drug-induced brain damage, and if so, how?
• What the Future Holds for Humans in the Light of Artificial Intelligence
• The Story of Two Nations after Decades of Conflict: North and South Korea
• Video Games and Their Learning Context in Schools
• Free Wi-Fi: Strategies for Enhancing the City's Economy

Strong Research Paper Titles

• Digital World Cybersecurity
• E-business to Provide New Paths for Booksellers
• Outsourcing for Large Businesses
• Preparing for College Costs for High School Students
• What News Reporters Should Do in the Digital Age and How to Do It: Examples
• The Transformative Power of Music: How Heavy Metal Impacted My Life

Best Essay Titles for College Students

• The Possible Benefits and Risks of Artificial Intelligence for Humans
• The Potential for Time Travel in Virtual Reality
• What Role Has Mathematics Played in Human History?
• How to Succeed in the Real Estate Industry
• E-Commerce: An Empire of Virtual Businesses Worth Millions of Dollars
• How to Achieve Financial Independence in the Digital Age Without Opening a Real Business

More Creative Titles for Essays

• When getting rewarded for their grades, would kids do better left alone?
• How Does Fake News Impact the Mainstream press?
• Homelessness in Contemporary Society: A Dilemma
• What News Reporters' Best Job Is in the Digital Age and How to Uphold It
• Elon Musk: Brilliant Mind or Insane Person?
• Positives and Negatives of Employing a Smoker
• Do We Employ the Appropriate Student Success Metrics?

Professional Academic Help

Now that you know how to make a good title for an essay, you should also understand that you should approach the task as a process. While composing your essay title, you must condense your whole thesis and point of discussion into a single, concise, yet powerful sentence. If you have time before your deadline, give it some thought and don't hurry.

Don't forget that you can always rely on our professional academic assistance, whether you need a reflection paper , ideas for a strong essay title, or any other academic papers. Consider the following words - write my essay for me - magic keywords for delegating your most complex tasks to our skilled writers!

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Q. How do I refer to a book by title in-text in APA format?

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Answered By: Gabe Gossett Last Updated: Jun 22, 2023     Views: 613662

The basic format for an in-text citation is: Title of the Book (Author Last Name, year).

One author: Where the Wild Things Are (Sendak, 1963) is a depiction of a child coping with his anger towards his mom.

Two authors (cite both names every time): Brabant and Mooney (1986) have used the comic strip to examine evidence of sex role stereotyping. OR The comic strip has been used to examine evidence of sex role stereotyping (Brabant & Mooney, 1986).

Three or more authors (cite the first author plus et al.): Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy (Clare et al., 2016) depicts a young man's experience at the Shadowhunter Academy, a place where being a former vampire is looked down upon.OR Clare et al. (2016) have crafted a unique story about a young man's journey to find himself.

No author: Cite the first few words of the reference entry (usually the title) and the year. Use double quotation marks around the title of an article or chapter, and italicize the title of a periodical, book, brochure, or report. Examples: From the book Study Guide (2000) ... or ("Reading," 1999).

Note: Titles of periodicals, books, brochures, or reports should be in italics and use normal title capitalization rules.

If you are citing multiple sources by multiple authors in-text, you can list all of them by the author's last name and year of publication within the same set of parentheses, separated by semicolons.

Example: (Adams, 1999; Jones & James, 2000; Miller, 1999)

For more information on how to cite books in-text and as a reference entry, see the APA Publication Manual (7th edition) Section 10.2 on pages 321-325 .

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Comments (13)

• This was very useful for me! I was having a really hard time finding information on how to mention an article title AND the author in text in APA so this was very helpful!!! by Ryan Waddell on Jun 27, 2019
• If I just mention that I used a book to teach a topic do I have to include it in the reference list? by Franw on Oct 17, 2019
• @Franw, if it is a source that informs your paper in any way, or if your reader would have reason to look it up, then you should include a full reference list entry for the book. by Gabe [Research & Writing Studio] on Oct 18, 2019
• Maybe I'm misunderstanding the question, but I think the OP is asking how to refer to a book title, not how to cite one. I believe APA uses quotation marks around book titles and MLA uses italics. by AB on Dec 12, 2019
• @AB: The first sentence has been tweaked to clarify title of book usage, reflecting the examples given. For APA style you should use italics for book titles. It would be quotation marks. by Gabe [Research & Writing Studio] on Dec 12, 2019
• Hi, can any one help me with in-text-citation of this, how can i cite it in the text Panel, I. L. (2002). Digital transformation: A framework for ICT literacy. Educational Testing Service, 1-53. by Milad on Aug 20, 2021
• @Milad: In that case it would be (Panel, 2002). If you are quoting, or otherwise choosing to include page numbers, put a comma after the year, then p. and the page number(s). by Gabe Gossett on Aug 20, 2021
• Hey, I'm a little bit curious, what if I'm mentioning a book and paraphrasing it but still want to give credit. Would I put the information into parenthesis instead? Like: Paraphrased info. ("Title in Italics" Author, year) by Kai on Sep 14, 2023
• @Kai: Apologies for not seeing your question sooner! (Our academic year has not started yet). If I am understanding your question correctly, what I suggest is referring to the book title in the narrative of your writing, rather than in the in-text citation. I do not see an examples of using a book title in an in-text citation except for rare circumstances including citing a classic religious text or using the title when there is no author information because it is the start of your reference list entry. Basically, APA's in-text convention is supposed to make it easy for your reader to locate the source being cited in the reference list. So the first part of the in-text citation, usually authors, comes first to locate it alphabetically. Putting the book title first when you have an author name can throw that off. by Gabe Gossett on Sep 21, 2023
• Perhaps this is along the lines of the response to Kai - Can you reference a book title as a common point of social understanding to demonstrate a common concept? Is official citing required if you use widely known titles such as "Where's Waldo" and "Who Moved My Cheese?" to make a point of illustration? by Chez Renee on Sep 30, 2023
• @Chez: Aside from some classical religious texts, if it is a published book, I'd try to make sure that it is appropriately cited for APA style. That said, I think I understand where it gets tricky with things like Where's Waldo, since that is a series of books and stating "Where's Waldo" is a cultural reference many people would understand, though you can't reasonably cite the entire series. I don't believe that APA gives guidance for this particular issue. If it is being referred to in order to back up a claim, it would help to cite a particular book. If not, then it might work to use a statement such as, "Hanford's Where's Waldo series . . ." by Gabe Gossett on Oct 02, 2023
• How to cite a dissertation thesis in apa form? by Elizabeth on Feb 05, 2024
• @Elizabeth: For citing a dissertation or thesis you can check out our page answering that here https://askus.library.wwu.edu/faq/153308 by Gabe Gossett on Feb 05, 2024

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How to Title a Book: What Do Good Book Titles Have In Common?

So you’ve (finally) finished your book, only to find one last question standing between you and the bestsellers list: how to title your book. Maybe you don’t like the working title you’ve been using these past few months. Perhaps you’ve come up with a title you love — but everyone else says that it might hurt your market potential.

So what makes for a truly good book title? Luckily, there’s a short, simple, 4-point checklist that will help you choose a book title that’s guaranteed to catch a reader’s roving eye. Only joking! Although that would be nice, wouldn’t it? While there’s no sure-fire method for formulating the perfect title, this post will give you ideas for devising a title that enhances your book and gives it the best chance of success.

We recommend downloading this actual free book title checklist to follow along while you read this post. Otherwise, let's get started!

FREE RESOURCE

Book Title Checklist

Create a title that stands out — and sells.

Why do book titles matter?

Without a book title, your book can't exist. Having a title in place before you start writing can help inform or reinforce your themes and motifs  as you plan your novel. To learn more about the planning process, go here for a  complete guide and a free book outline template. Secondly, if you don’t already think of the title of your book as a marketing decision, start now. Your book title might be the single most important marketing choice you make. The title plays a key part in creating a first impression — possibly even more so than your book cover design . Think about the last time you browsed Amazon or looked at a bestsellers list. Chances are that what caught your eye was the:

• The book cover design, and

Now, a good title won’t magically make a book sell, but a bad one will hinder sales at best and, at worst, alienate its core readership. With that in mind, let’s start making some good decisions!

What do good titles for books have in common?

Like we said earlier, there are no hard-and-fast rules for crafting the perfect title. There are, however, some patterns and similarities between good titles that may help you choose your own.

They intrigue and entice the reader

Think along the lines of: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?  by Philip K. Dick.

They match the book to its genre

Think along the lines of: Me Before You by Jojo Moyes and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie .

They are (normally) of a sensible length

The aim is for your readers to have some idea what’s going on, without revealing too much or having a paragraph on the front cover. Long titles can work — just think of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society by Mary Ann Shaffer — so long as people can recall just enough of it to find it on Amazon (or by asking a bookseller in a store).

Think along the lines of: The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson and Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov.

They help readers discover the book

Think along the lines of: Beekeeping for Dummies or Why We Sleep: The New Science of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker.

Things to watch out for

Whilst there aren't things you  need  to do, and so there aren't things you need to  not do when choosing a book title, there are certain things that are best given a wide berth.

Overly complex language

Even books about a specialist subject can have a simple, accessible title, like Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. Remember that a title is there to intrigue and entice — not repel and frighten off readers by making them think that your book is going to read like a thesaurus.

One-word titles

If you title your non-fiction book “Bottles,” it’s going to be very difficult to rank as the first search result: you’d be competing against people selling hot water bottles, books on the ecological impact of plastic water bottles, and research on bluebottle flies. Avoid confusion by striking the balance between cryptic titles and ones that attempt to summarize the entire book on the front cover. (The exception is flash fiction , where the brevity of one-word titles matches the brevity of the story itself.)

Potential confusion

Don’t get caught out — be careful not to choose a title that might be offensive in certain regions, or that might have an unintended double meaning. Equally, if your book title relies on a reference that is extremely local, or perhaps a little niche, it might be an idea to reconsider and aim for something more universal.

How to title a book: a couple of methods

There really are no bad ideas when you’re coming up with potential titles — just ones that are better than others. Try to write down anything that comes to mind.

Start free writing

Write absolutely anything that comes into your head: words, phrases, names, places, adjectives — the works. You’ll be surprised how much workable content comes out from such a strange exercise.

Look for formulas or set phrases

Obviously, we’re not advocating plagiarism, but try playing around with formats like:

“The _____ of _______”

“______ and the _____”

These will work for certain genres, though they are by no means the only patterns you can play around with. Have you noticed how many blockbuster thrillers these days feature the word “woman” or “ girl” somewhere in the title?

Use characters as inspiration

If your central character has a quirky name or a title (like Doctor or Detective) you can definitely incorporate this into your book title. Just look at Jane Eyre , Percy Jackson , or Harry Potter , for instance —  working with one or more or your characters’ names is a surefire way to get some title ideas down. Equally, you can add a little detail, like Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure , to add a little color to a name and make it title-worthy.

Do the same for setting

Is your book set somewhere particularly interesting or significant? Even if your title isn’t just where the action takes place (like Middlemarch by George Eliot), it’s something to have in the back of your mind. You can include other details, like The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum or Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay, to give your readers a sense of action and character, as well as setting (which tend to be linked).

Is there a particular phrase or idea you can work with?

Think Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird here — this is a central symbol and significant piece of dialogue in the novel. It’s enigmatic (what does it even mean? Is it a warning? An instruction?) and makes us really sit up when these words appear in the text itself. Try and think of your inspiration for writing your book or sum up your central theme in a few words, and see if these inspire anything.

Find inspiration from other works

You might be surprised at how many books refer to other works in their titles ( The Fault in Our Stars by John Green comes from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar , and Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men takes its inspiration from a Robert Burns poem). Going this route allows authors to use an already beautiful and poetic turn of phrase that alludes to a theme in their own book. From Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls to Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials , so many books have used this technique that might also work for you.

To subtitle, or not to subtitle?

In non-fiction publishing, there’s a trend of evocative or abstract titles, followed by a subtitle that communicates the content (and is packed with delicious keywords that the Amazon search engine can’t resist). This is also another way to get around long titles — and to add a little panache to an otherwise dry subject matter. In the United States, it’s also quite common to have “A Novel” as a subtitle (if, you know, it’s a novel). In the United Kingdom, this practice is much rarer.

Start with a generated title!

If you’ve gone through all of the above and are still wringing out your brain trying to come up with the golden formula — fear not! There are other ways to get the cogs whirring and inspiration brewing, such as title generators .

What are the rules for choosing a book title?

There are no actual rules when it comes to naming your book. Editors and agents might have their own rules of thumb. But hey, it’s your book and you can call it what you want to. That being said, each retailer has its own particular rules and standards for titles — rules you’ll need to adhere to if you intend to publish there. Let’s take a look at Amazon’s guidelines. Not permitted in Amazon book titles:

• Unauthorized reference to other titles or authors – so don’t think you can get away with titling your book “Stephen King’s Dreams.”
• Unauthorized reference to a trademarked term.
• Reference to sales rank (e.g., "bestselling") – even if it is a bestselling book.
• Reference to advertisements or promotions (e.g., "free") –  a lot of people search for ‘Free books’, which is why Amazon doesn’t want you to call it that.
• The title field should contain only the actual title of your book as it appears on your book cover.
• Foul, vulgar, or obscene language – as Jeff Wheeland , author of  There's More to Life than a Shitty Cubicle found out, you can't advertise your book on Amazon if you swear in the title.

Whilst Amazon doesn’t always effectively police their own rules, if you want to build a reputation as an author, you’ll naturally want to avoid underhand practices.

Test your book title

Congrats! If you’ve got this far, it’s time to test your title. Thought you were done? Oh, no. Even if you are 110% certain that you’ve hit upon the next Harry Potter title-equivalent, a little market research won’t hurt and could be the crucial difference between an okay and a bestselling title.

Here are some ways you can check if your title floats in the real world and in the heads of your audience who, after all, are the most important people in this process . It’s vital to remember that book titles are ultimately for readers.

Start local

Begin with your family and friends, but remember that if you just poll inside your immediate circle for feedback, chances are it will be biased towards the positive and not totally objective. While this may be great for the ego, at this stage in the game you need some genuinely constructive criticism. Distinguish who your target audience is (they might not be your friends), and try to get some feedback from these people.

Facebook groups

Like many things, there is a Facebook group for this exact purpose. Just searching for ‘book title review’ or ‘test book title’ will yield some preliminary results. All it takes is to put up a post asking people to choose between two or three, and some real-life (probably literary-headed) people will give their honest opinions. If you're looking for a group to help you out, why not check out The Street Team , a book marketing group moderated by Reedsy?

SurveyMonkey

In a similar vein, gain the opinion of people slightly further out of your inner circle by making a survey on SurveyMonkey and share the link with as many people as you can. Obviously, this will start amongst friends and family, but if you encourage them to share it the ripple effect should kick in and you’ll be getting some valued feedback from all sorts of participants in no time. Nothing beats genuine, honest opinions, and it’s even better the wider you can cast your feedback — people are less likely to be clouded by personal bias if they don’t know you.

Not a fan of SurveyMonkey, or want to try different survey methods? Check out this list of useful SurveyMonkey alternatives .

Run an Adwords campaign

Depending on your technological capabilities (although it sounds more complex than it is in practice) you can A/B test your title, provided you have a final two, via an Adwords campaign . This way, success is measured by clicks, and you have in-depth analysis to work off. This will require a bit more work than the others, maybe involving creating ads that have people sign up to for a free sample or free chapter of your book. But, like most things that take more effort, the results will be worth it.

Unbiased surveys

We were recently introduced to Pickfu — a testing service that allows authors to ask strangers their opinion. Their tagline is ‘optimize without an audience,’ shouting loud and clear how they’re going to help you test your book title, even if you don’t have hundreds of willing participants that you know personally. Getting the opinions of strangers is just as (if not more) useful than polling those you know personally — they are sometimes going to be more like your target audience than those closest to you.

Now it’s your turn

Your book title is the foundation that your book will stand on once it’s published, and will be a key part of convincing readers (or publishers!) to take a chance on your book. Hopefully, all this will get the ball rolling on your book title, and we’d love to hear the results!  Once you've got a title you're happy with, double check you're capitalizing it properly by reading through title capitalization rules . You can't be too careful.

3 responses

Tom Chmielewski says:

27/06/2018 – 18:51

I use basically the same tactic that I used writing headlines for newspapers and magazines I've worked for. I search out a phrase that hits at some core idea in my novel. In my first novel, "Lunar Dust, Martian Sands," I took from a prayer at a Martian memorial service for a crew who died when their tug exploded, and partly quoted the prayer on the back cover. "We travel beyoond Earth on Moon dust, and build our homes from the sands of Mars." The Moon dust is the Heiium-3 found in the dust to fuel the fusion drives for the interplanatery tugs. The Martian sand is the raw materialls on the planet colonists use to build their homes and other structures. Martian Sands is also the name I'm using for the book series.

Esbe van Heerden says:

19/12/2018 – 05:13

These are amazing tips on book titling, wow! This blog in general is sooo helpful. Something I’ve seen work for nonfiction authors, in particular, is a really simple formula: 1. The defining main title 2. The informative subtitle 📚The Defining Main Title📚 Make sure your main title is short (around 5 words or less) so that it is easy to remember, and specific. It needs to be easy to say when you talk about your book, and something you wouldn’t be embarrassed saying over and over again at a formal event. It could be something to do with your brand (Start With Why—part of Simon Sinek's brand), a movement in your industry (Deep Work—a focus-based movement in the entrepreneurial industry) or something else related to your book's theme that's catchy. 📚The informative subtitle📚 Make sure the subtitle gives context—it can be longer, more SEO-friendly, and descriptive. This is especially important when your main title is catchy or based on a brand, because that means the main title isn’t necessarily a good indicator for a fresh reader as to what the book is about. So the subtitle needs to give a new reader this context. When brainstorming subtitle ideas, here are three quick tips:
 1. Don't be a stuck record player! Avoid writing a subtitle that informs the reader about something they can already glean from the main title—don’t repeat ideas from your main title.
 2. Become a keyword master. Amazon is the biggest search engine after Google and YouTube and your subtitle should include a few key keywords. In saying that, don’t overdo it—it still needs to make sense and sound genuine to potential readers.
 3. Be clear and concise. Don’t let people get bored before they even finish reading the title of your book! And once you’ve come up with a few potentials, always ask yourself: What does the title I’m considering sound like when I say it out loud to new acquaintances at a party? If you are embarrassed to say it or can’t remember it—you’re in trouble. If people get what your book will be about after hearing your title—you’re onto a winner.

ginger northcutt says:

20/02/2020 – 12:16

i have become a great fan of reedsy this year. just like this one on titling, all the articles, how-to breakdowns, the courses (& much more still to explore), they all have been super-informative & offered w/ clarity & then more resources are given. you will be seeing me hanging around reedsy's place more often, for sure!

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Like My Book Title? Thanks, I Borrowed It.

Literary allusions are everywhere. What are they good for?

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By A.O. Scott

You see it everywhere, even if you don’t always recognize it: the literary allusion. Quick! Which two big novels of the past two years borrowed their titles from “Macbeth”? Nailing the answer — “ Birnam Wood ” and “ Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow ” — might make you feel a little smug.

Perhaps the frisson of cleverness ( I know where that’s from!), or the flip-side cringe of ignorance ( I should know where that’s from! ), is enough to spur you to buy a book, the way a search-optimized headline compels you to click a link. After all, titles are especially fertile ground for allusion-mongering. The name of a book becomes more memorable when it echoes something you might have heard — or think you should have heard — before.

This kind of appropriation seems to be a relatively modern phenomenon. Before the turn of the 20th century, titles were more descriptive than allusive. The books themselves may have been stuffed with learning, but the words on the covers were largely content to give the prospective reader the who (“Pamela,” “Robinson Crusoe,” “Frankenstein”), where (“Wuthering Heights,” “The Mill on the Floss,” “Treasure Island”) or what (“The Scarlet Letter,” “War and Peace,” “The Way We Live Now”) of the book.

Somehow, by the middle of the 20th century, literature had become an echo chamber. Look homeward, angel! Ask not for whom the sound and the fury slouches toward Bethlehem in dubious battle. When Marcel Proust was first translated into English, he was made to quote Shakespeare, and “In Search of Lost Time” (the literal, plainly descriptive French title) became “Remembrance of Things Past,” a line from Sonnet 30 .

Recent Proust translators have erased the Shakespearean reference in fidelity to the original, but the habit of dressing up new books in secondhand clothing persists, in fiction and nonfiction alike. Last year, in addition to “Birnam Wood,” there were Jonathan Rosen’s “ The Best Minds ,” with its whisper of Allen Ginsberg’s “ Howl ,” Paul Harding’s “ This Other Eden ” (“ Richard II ”), and William Egginton’s “ The Rigor of Angels ” (Borges). The best-seller lists and publishers’ catalogs contain multitudes ( Walt Whitman ). Here comes everybody! (James Joyce).

If you must write prose and poems, the words you use should be your own. I didn’t say that: Morrissey did, in a deepish Smiths cut (“ Cemetry Gates , ” from 1986), which misquotes Shakespeare and name-checks John Keats, William Butler Yeats and Oscar Wilde — possibly the most reliably recycled writers (along with John Milton and the authors of the King James Bible) in the English language.

Not that any of them would have minded. When Keats wrote that “ a thing of beauty is a joy forever ,” he surely hoped that at least that much of “ Endymion ” would outlive him. It’s a beautiful sentiment! And he may have been right. Does anyone read his four-part, 4,000-line elegy for Thomas Chatterton outside a college English class, or even for that matter inside one? Nonetheless, that opening line may ring a bell if you remember it from the movies “ Mary Poppins ,” “Yellow Submarine” or “ White Men Can’t Jump .”

Wilde’s witticism and bons mots have survived even as some of his longer works have languished. If it’s true (as he said) that only superficial people do not judge by appearances, maybe it follows that shallow gleaning is the deepest kind of reading. Or maybe, to paraphrase Yeats, devoted readers of poetry lack all conviction , while reckless quoters are full of passionate intensity .

Like everything else, this is the fault of the internet, which has cannibalized our reading time while offering facile, often spurious, pseudo-erudition to anyone with the wit to conduct a search. As Mark Twain once said to Winston Churchill, if you Google, you don’t have to remember anything.

Seriously though: I come not to bury the practice of allusion, but to praise it. (“ Julius Caesar ”) And also to ask, in all earnestness and with due credit to Edwin Starr , “ Seinfeld” and Leo Tolstoy : What is it good for?

The language centers of our brains are dynamos of originality. A competent speaker of any language is capable of generating intelligible, coherent sentences that nobody has uttered before. That central insight of modern linguistics, advanced by Noam Chomsky in the 1950s and ’60s, is wonderfully democratic. Every one of us is a poet in our daily speech, an inglorious Milton ( Thomas Gray ), a Shakespeare minting new coins of eloquence.

Of course, actual poets are congenital thieves (as T.S. Eliot or someone like him may have said), plucking words and phrases from the pages of their peers and precursors. The rest of us are poets in that sense, too. If our brains are foundries, they are also warehouses, crammed full of clichés, advertising slogans, movie catchphrases, song lyrics, garbled proverbs and jokes we heard on the playground at recess in third grade. Also great works of literature.

There are those who sift through this profusion with the fanatical care of mushroom hunters, collecting only the most palatable and succulent specimens. Others crash through the thickets, words latching onto us like burrs on a sweater. If we tried to remove them, the whole garment — our consciousness, in this unruly metaphor — might come unraveled.

That may also be true collectively. If we were somehow able to purge our language of its hand-me-down elements, we might lose language itself. What happens if nobody reads anymore, or if everyone reads different things? Does the practice of literary quotation depend on a stable set of common references? Or does it function as a kind of substitute for a shared body of knowledge that may never have existed at all?

The old literary canon — that dead white men’s club of star-bellied sneetches ( Dr. Seuss ) — may have lost some of its luster in recent decades, but it has shown impressive staying power as a cornucopia of quotes. Not the only one, by any means (or memes). Television, popular music, advertising and social media all provide abundant fodder, and the way we read now (or don’t) has a way of rendering it all equivalent. The soul selects her own society ( Emily Dickinson ).

When I was young, my parents had a fat anthology of mid-20th-century New Yorker cartoons , a book I pored over with obsessive zeal. One drawing that baffled me enough to stick in my head featured a caption with the following words: “It’s quips and cranks and wanton wiles, nods and becks and wreathed smiles.” What on earth was that? It wasn’t until I was in graduate school, cramming for an oral exam in Renaissance literature, that I found the answer in “ L’Allegro, ” an early poem by Milton, more often quoted as the author of “Paradise Lost.”

Not that having the citation necessarily helps. The cartoon, by George Booth, depicts a woman in her living room, addressing members of a multigenerational, multispecies household. There are cats, codgers, a child with a yo-yo, a bird in a cage and a dog chained to the sofa. Through the front window, the family patriarch can be seen coming up the walk, a fedora on his head and a briefcase in his right hand. His arrival — “Here comes Poppa” — is the occasion for the woman’s Miltonic pep talk.

Who is she? Why is she quoting “L’Allegro”? Part of the charm, I now suspect, lies in the absurdity of those questions. But I also find myself wondering: Were New Yorker readers in the early 1970s, when the cartoon was first published, expected to get the allusion right off the bat? They couldn’t Google it. Or would they have laughed at the incongruous eruption of an old piece of poetry they couldn’t quite place?

Maybe what’s funny is that most people wouldn’t know what that lady was talking about. And maybe the same comic conceit animates an earlier James Thurber drawing reprinted in the same book. In this one, a wild-eyed woman bursts into a room, wearing a floppy hat and wielding a basket of meadow flowers. “I come from haunts of coot and hern!” she exclaims to the baffled company, disturbing their cocktail party.

That’s it. That’s the gag.

Were readers also baffled? It turns out that Thurber’s would-be nature goddess is quoting “ The Brook ,” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. (I’ve never read it either.) Is it necessary to get the reference to get the joke? If you chuckle in recognition, and complete the stanza without missing a beat — “I make a sudden sally/And sparkle out among the fern,/To bicker down a valley” — is the joke on you?

It’s possible, from the standpoint of the present, to assimilate these old pictures to the familiar story about the decline of a civilization based in part on common cultural knowledge. Sure. Whatever. Things fall apart ( Yeats ). In the cartoons’ own terms, though, spouting snippets of poetry is an unmistakable sign of eccentricity — the pastime of kooky women and the male illustrators who commit them to paper. This is less a civilization than a sodality of weirdos, a visionary company ( Hart Crane ) of misfits. But don’t quote me on that.

A.O. Scott is a critic at large for The Times’s Book Review, writing about literature and ideas. He joined The Times in 2000 and was a film critic until early 2023. More about A.O. Scott

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Cash-strapped Trump is now selling $60 Bibles, U.S. Constitution included

Rachel Treisman

Then-President Donald Trump holds up a Bible outside St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C., during a controversial 2020 photo-op. Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

Then-President Donald Trump holds up a Bible outside St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C., during a controversial 2020 photo-op.

Former President Donald Trump is bringing together church and state in a gilded package for his latest venture, a $60 "God Bless The USA" Bible complete with copies of the nation's founding documents.

Trump announced the launch of the leather-bound, large-print, King James Bible in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday — a day after the social media company surged in its trading debut and two days after a New York appeals court extended his bond deadline to comply with a ruling in a civil fraud case and slashed the bond amount by 61%.

"Happy Holy Week! Let's Make America Pray Again," Trump wrote. "As we lead into Good Friday and Easter, I encourage you to get a copy of the God Bless The USA Bible."

Consider This from NPR

Why trump's persecution narrative resonates with christian supporters.

The Bible is inspired by "God Bless the USA," the patriotic Lee Greenwood anthem that has been a fixture at many a Trump rally (and has a long political history dating back to Ronald Reagan). It is the only Bible endorsed by Trump as well as Greenwood, according to its promotional website .

The Bible is only available online and sells for $59.99 (considerably more expensive than the traditional Bibles sold at major retailers, or those available for free at many churches and hotels). It includes Greenwood's handwritten chorus of its titular song as well as copies of historical documents including the U.S. Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Pledge of Allegiance.

"Many of you have never read them and don't know the liberties and rights you have as Americans, and how you are being threatened to lose those rights," Trump said in a three-minute video advertisement.

"Religion and Christianity are the biggest things missing from this country, and I truly believe that we need to bring them back and we have to bring them back fast."

'You gotta be tough': White evangelicals remain enthusiastic about Donald Trump

Trump critics on both sides of the aisle quickly criticized the product, characterizing it as self-serving and hypocritical.

Conservative political commentator Charlie Sykes slammed him for "commodifying the Bible during Holy Week," while Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota critiqued him for "literally taking a holy book and selling it, and putting it out there in order to make money for his campaign."

Trump says the money isn't going to his campaign, but more on that below.

Klobuchar added that Trump's public attacks on others are "not consistent with the teachings of the Bible," calling this "one more moment of hypocrisy." Tara Setmayer, a senior adviser for anti-Trump Republican PAC the Lincoln Project, called it "blasphemous ."

And former Rep. Liz Cheney, a Republican from Wyoming, trolled Trump with a social media post alluding to his alleged extramarital affairs.

"Happy Holy Week, Donald," she wrote. "Instead of selling Bibles, you should probably buy one. And read it, including Exodus 20:14 ."

Christianity is an increasingly prominent part of his campaign

Trump has made a point of cultivating Christian supporters since his 2016 presidential campaign and remains popular with white evangelicals despite his multiple divorces, insults toward marginalized groups and allegations of extramarital affairs and sexual assault.

And his narrative of being persecuted — including in the courts — appears to resonate with his many Christian supporters.

Trump has increasingly embraced Christian nationalist ideas in public. He promised a convention of religious broadcasters last month that he would use a second term to defend Christian values from the "radical left," swearing that "no one will be touching the cross of Christ under the Trump administration."

He made similar comments in the Bible promotional video, in which he warned that "Christians are under siege" and the country is "going haywire" because it lost religion.

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"We must defend God in the public square and not allow the media or the left-wing groups to silence, censor or discriminate against us," he said. "We have to bring Christianity back into our lives and back into what will be again a great nation."

Trump himself is not known to be particularly religious or a regular churchgoer. He long identified as Presbyterian but announced in 2020 that he identified as nondenominational .

A Pew Research Center survey released earlier this month found that most people with positive views of Trump don't see him as especially religious, but think he stands up for people with religious beliefs like their own.

Trump said in the promotional video that he has many Bibles at home.

"It's my favorite book," he said, echoing a comment he's made in previous years. "It's a lot of people's favorite book."

The Impact Of Christian Nationalism On American Democracy

Trump's relationship to the Bible has been a point of discussion and sometimes controversy over the years.

In 2020, amid protests over George Floyd's murder, he posed with a Bible outside a Washington, D.C., church, for which he was widely criticized. U.S. Park Police and National Guard troops had tear-gassed peaceful protesters in the area beforehand, seemingly to make way for the photo-op, though a watchdog report the following year determined otherwise .

That same year, a clip of a 2015 Bloomberg interview, in which Trump declines to name his favorite — or any — Bible verse resurfaced on social media and went viral.

Bible sales are unlikely to solve Trump's financial problems

An FAQ section on the Bible website says no profits will go to Trump's reelection campaign.

"GodBlessTheUSABible.com is not political and has nothing to do with any political campaign," it says.

However, the site adds that it uses Trump's name, likeness and image "under paid license from CIC Ventures LLC."

Trump is listed as the manager, president, secretary and treasurer of CIC Ventures LLC in a financial disclosure from last year.

Here's what happens if Trump can't pay his $454 million bond

Trump's sales pitch focuses on bringing religion back to America.

"I want to have a lot of people have it," he said at one point in the video. "You have to have it for your heart and for your soul."

But many are wondering whether Trump has something else to gain from Bible sales while facing under mounting financial pressure.

There's his presidential reelection campaign, which has raised only about half of what Biden's has so far this cycle. Trump acknowledged Monday that he "might" spend his own money on his campaign, something he hasn't done since 2016.

There's also his mounting legal expenses, as he faces four criminal indictments and numerous civil cases. Trump posted bond to support a $83.3 million jury award granted to writer E. Jean Carroll in a defamation case earlier this month, and was due to put up another $454 million in a civil fraud case this past Monday.

Trump is on the verge of a windfall of billions of dollars. Here are 3 things to know

His lawyers had said last week that they had approached 30 companies for help making bond, but doing so was a "practical impossibility" — prompting New York's attorney general to confirm that if Trump did not pay, she would move to seize his assets . On Monday, the appeals court reduced the bond amount to $175 million and gave Trump another 10 days to post it.

Trump has evidently been trying to raise money in other ways.

The day after the civil fraud judgment was announced, he debuted a line of $399 golden, high-top sneakers , which sold out in hours . The company behind his social media app, Truth Social, started trading on the Nasdaq exchange on Tuesday, which could deliver him a windfall of more than $3 billion — though he can't sell his shares for another six months.

• Donald J. Trump
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Kim Mulkey: Everything you need to know about LSU’s women’s basketball coach

Last season when LSU beat Iowa for the NCAA title,  Kim Mulkey became the first coach  in the women’s game to lead two schools to national championships. She was also the first person to win titles as a coach and player (she attended Louisiana Tech). 

Before arriving at LSU in April 2021, Mulkey had led Baylor to three national titles and 19 NCAA Tournament appearances in 20 years. In 2012, she led the Bears to the first 40-0 mark in NCAA history.

Here's what to know about the LSU coach as Mulkey has the Tigers back in the Sweet 16 this year:

Mulkey and her feud with the Washington Post

A day after going on a tirade about a "hit piece" the Washington Post is writing about her and threatening to sue, Mulkey called the reporter, Kent Babb, "sleazy" Sunday.

FOLLOW THE MADNESS: NCAA basketball bracket, scores, schedules, teams and more.

Rumors began circulating Friday that the Washington Post was planning to publish a major investigative piece on the LSU coach. The story still had not published as of Monday morning, but Mulkey confirmed it with her fiery statement Saturday during the  Tigers’ press conference .

Mulkey said Babb has been trying to “put a hit piece together” for two years. She said she has “hired the best defamation law firm in the country, and I will sue the Washington Post if they publish a false story on me. Not many people are in a position to hold these kinds of journalists accountable but I am, and I’ll do it.” 

How much does Mulkey make as LSU women’s basketball head coach?

Mulkey is the  highest paid Division I women’s basketball coach  at $3.26 million this season, according to USA TODAY’s review of compensation for Division I coaches. She is paid more than South Carolina’s Dawn Staley and Connecticut's Geno Auriemma, who both make $3.1 million. 

Mulkey said when athletic director Scott Woodward recruited her, she didn’t demand a certain salary for herself or assistants. 

“I never put a dollar figure on anything (during negotiations),” Mulkey said. “What I did ask was, ‘Are you making a financial investment? I need to tell you what I make at Baylor. Are you saying that you want to hire me and my staff with the understanding that we’re not taking a pay cut?’ ”

How old is Kim Mulkey?

Mulkey, who grew up in Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana, playing baseball and basketball, is 61. She led Hammond High School to four consecutive state championships and was class valedictorian with a perfect 4.0 grade point average.

Mulkey as a Louisiana Tech basketball star

As a player,  she was a button of a point guard, a fierce competitor  who wore her hair in French braided pigtails. During an international tour with Team USA in 1982, Mulkey tried to take a charge on the Soviet Union's 7-footer Uliana Semenova. The collision sent both players crashing to the floor. No foul was called, but Mulkey later told a sportswriter that “it was still a great feeling.” She won a national championship with Louisiana Tech and a gold medal on Pat Summitt’s 1984 Olympic team.

Mulkey and her penchant for over-the-top outfits on game day

From butterflies to rhinestones to feathers, Mulkey turns heads on game day for her colorful and unique ensembles. She seems to relish the attention her fashion brings to the game.

“There are LSU women who are graduates, who are famous designers, and they send me jackets and say …  'Coach, quite honestly, I don't know anything about basketball, but I will come just to see what you wear,’ " Mulkey said last year at the Final Four . “Well, you know what, I want those that come to the games for that reason to keep coming, and I want them to learn the game of basketball.

“Those that come because of basketball, forget what I wear on the sideline, look at the product on the floor. Don't make what I wear bigger than what's on that floor and what I have done X's and O's-wise as a coach," she said. "But if me wearing their jackets and things like that helps them but it also sells one more ticket or puts one more set of eyeballs on our game, so be it.”

Contributing: Nancy Armour, Lindsay Schnell, Blake Toppmeyer