Title dilemma: The Golden Viking or Fury of the Norsemen?
I’m just about to start work on Book 5 of my Fire Born Viking series, and because my publisher is super-efficient and likes to get on top of things early in the process, he has asked me, quite reasonably, to tell him what the book will be called, and what it will be about. So I said to him . . . Ah, um, er . . . Can I get back to you? The truth is I have spent all summer working on something else, and I am not super-efficient and able to keep on top of things very well. So I thought I would ask my readers to help me out.
I have a few vague ideas about the story. It’s going to be a classic Viking tale of longships and raiding with Bjarki and Tor setting sail from Scandinavia to make their living by piracy. I thought they might go to England – but maybe they will just raid the coast of Francia. I told you I only had a vaguest idea. I also thought they should be very successful at being Vikings, amassing lots of glittery loot – and I had the idea that blond-haired Bjarki could start using the nom de guerre The Golden Viking. Because after the events in King of the North (Fire Born 4 – out on September 28) his beloved bearskin cloak has gone a bit yellow-ish, and if he had loads of gold, well then . . . But I also like the title Fury of the Norsemen.
The Fury title comes, as I’m sure some of you will know, from a Latin prayer that was supposed to have been said in many English churches at the beginning of the Viking Age: “A furore Normannorum libera nos, Domine” which translates as” From the fury of the Norsemen deliver us, O Lord”. This is now widely believed to be apocryphal but I’ve always liked the resonance of it. And when I was thinking about Bjarki and Tor coming to England, that struck me as a suitable title for the book. The problem with this title is that it contains the word “Norsemen”. I wonder if that is too close to the “North” in King of the North.
So I was hoping you, the reader, might help me out. Which do you prefer? Let me know by messaging me on this website (Go to the Contact tab on the bar above this blog). I can’t promise to pick the one you like – or even that I will pick one of the two options. I have to keep an open mind, and the marketing folks at Canelo my publisher will want to have their say, too. But I would really value your opinions. Thank you!
King of the North (Fire Born 4) will be published on September 28. If you don’t yet know the series, you had better start with The Last Berserker (Fire Born 1), followed by The Saxon Wolf (Fire Born 2) etc . . .
Just finished Kung of the North (hugely enjoyable) so given the violence and cunning in that, I would go with something like Viking Fury or Raid of the Mavericks….
‘Fury of the Norsemen’ works for me. I like the origin story that comes with it.