The title of a book is the hand we offer the reader, their first introduction to the message, the story, and the spirit of the work. It’s that first introduction that can persuade someone to buy the novel and potentially lead to a lasting literary relationship.
For authors from marginalized communities, the book title can carry extra weight — the weight of history, the weight of flawed expectations, but also the weight of freedom and possibility. When I selected People of Means as the title for my sophomore novel, I knew it might be a fraught choice. How would people react to the idea of Black folks being upper middle class and part of the bourgeois set? Media portrayals of Black people can be problematic and limiting at best. I wanted to showcase our elite without any qualifiers or explanation.
Often, authors submit an initial title choice to the publishing house and then wait for feedback. Sometimes, an editor will ask the author to generate ten to fifteen new options for titles with the sales and marketing team weighing in on which ones will hook and captivate a reader. I got lucky on the title for my debut novel, The Kindest Lie, and no one at the publisher blinked an eye or questioned it. When I turned in People of Means, I held my breath, hopeful that the title wouldn’t raise any eyebrows. It didn’t, or at least no one said anything to me. Just the opposite. Everyone loved the title immediately.
I still remember the day I shared the title and description of People of Means on my Instagram feed. Several Black authors and readers gave me a virtual fist bump, saying I see you, and that’s what I was hoping for. I wanted my community to move out of the realm of being pigeonholed as a monolith and finally feel seen in all of its complexity. We occupy every rung of the socioeconomic strata, and our stories should reflect that.
Brilliant books that preceded mine gave me permission to be bold with the title:
An American Marriage by Tayari Jones
First up is An American Marriage by Tayari Jones, which chronicles a Black marriage and the life-altering impact of incarceration on the family. With the prison industrial complex and the backdrop of these newlyweds trying to find their way in this country, the story is quintessentially American. I recall hearing Tayari say in an interview that even she was skeptical about whether this was a fitting title for her work. Did she have the right to claim Roy and Celestial’s story as American? Of course she did. What we often wrestle with is seeing ourselves at the center of what it means to be American.
High-Risk Homosexual by Edgar Gomez
When I initially read the title of Edgar Gomez’s memoir, I gasped. High-Risk Homosexual stopped me in my tracks with how provocative and even shameful that label sounds. People aren’t supposed to think that way and describe people as such, yet the cruelty is often the point and members of the LGBTQ+ community often find themselves on the receiving end of these slurs. Edgar’s doctor had said he was high risk for H.I.V., something that confounded Edgar and many in the queer community. Edgar took something confusing and scary, and confronted it head-on via the title of his memoir.
Hell of a Book by Jason Mott
In an interview with Jason Mott, I teasingly accused him of being full of himself based on his choice of a book title. The truth was I begrudgingly admired any author, especially a Black one, fearless enough to title his novel Hell of a Book. A Black author wrote this book about a Black author on tour promoting his new book. Many literary luminaries described this funny, painful book about racism as “a hell of a book” and it indeed lived up to its title as the winner of the National Book Award.
