How Love Minus Eighty got its title
Hi again,
I received some big news a few weeks ago: my next novel, Defenders has been optioned by Warner Brothers! The novel will be published next year, and hopefully (though it's never a guarantee) a movie will follow.
Meanwhile, the film option on Love Minus Eighty has expired, so my fabulous film agent is working his magic, seeking a studio/producer/screenwriter.
In the meantime, if anyone is curious about how I arrived at the title, here's the story. (I wrote more extensively about this, and choosing titles in general, over at Magical Words).
Love Minus Eighty is based on the Hugo Award winning short story, "Bridesicle", and that was my first thought for a title.
The people at Orbit Books thought a decent percentage of potential readers would be turned off by the title "Bridesicle", and consequently never check to see what it was about. I could see that–when I first wrote the short story, my wife hated "Bridesicle". I thought it was provocative. It was one of the few times I didn’t take my wife’s advice, because she’s incredibly perceptive. Later, some readers told me they didn’t read the story because they found the title distasteful.
So Bridesicle was out, and that left me without a title. My wife provided the first piece for a new title. She once worked in a biology lab, where people often referred to tissue samples being “in the minus eighty”, because tissue samples must be stored at -80 degrees Fahrenheit to remain viable. I tried In the Minus Eighty out on various people, and the consensus was that it wasn’t quite right. It was too vague. Ian Creasey, a writer who critiqued the first draft of the novel, suggested I make it Love in the Minus Eighty instead, to better reflect what the novel was about. I ran this by Tom Bauman, my editor at Orbit at the time. He bounced it around with some of their creative people, and they suggested making it Love Minus Eighty. They thought that would look good on the jacket, and had the right sort of pithy, mysterious ring to it. I loved it.
So as you can see, the title was a real team effort!
I received some big news a few weeks ago: my next novel, Defenders has been optioned by Warner Brothers! The novel will be published next year, and hopefully (though it's never a guarantee) a movie will follow.
Meanwhile, the film option on Love Minus Eighty has expired, so my fabulous film agent is working his magic, seeking a studio/producer/screenwriter.
In the meantime, if anyone is curious about how I arrived at the title, here's the story. (I wrote more extensively about this, and choosing titles in general, over at Magical Words).
Love Minus Eighty is based on the Hugo Award winning short story, "Bridesicle", and that was my first thought for a title.
The people at Orbit Books thought a decent percentage of potential readers would be turned off by the title "Bridesicle", and consequently never check to see what it was about. I could see that–when I first wrote the short story, my wife hated "Bridesicle". I thought it was provocative. It was one of the few times I didn’t take my wife’s advice, because she’s incredibly perceptive. Later, some readers told me they didn’t read the story because they found the title distasteful.
So Bridesicle was out, and that left me without a title. My wife provided the first piece for a new title. She once worked in a biology lab, where people often referred to tissue samples being “in the minus eighty”, because tissue samples must be stored at -80 degrees Fahrenheit to remain viable. I tried In the Minus Eighty out on various people, and the consensus was that it wasn’t quite right. It was too vague. Ian Creasey, a writer who critiqued the first draft of the novel, suggested I make it Love in the Minus Eighty instead, to better reflect what the novel was about. I ran this by Tom Bauman, my editor at Orbit at the time. He bounced it around with some of their creative people, and they suggested making it Love Minus Eighty. They thought that would look good on the jacket, and had the right sort of pithy, mysterious ring to it. I loved it.
So as you can see, the title was a real team effort!
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