The good news is that I actually opened the Bounds of Decorum file and have been thinking about what to do with it. The bad news is that I'm not actually writing it. I had to turn in the manuscript for The Last Man in the World (soon to be renamed Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy: The Last Man in the World, not by my choice), and I also polished up my short story "A Whiff of Darkness" (now renamed "A Brighter Future") which is now posted at 50 Miles. It's enough to make a person think about issues of titling a story.

Follow up:

Both of the name changes above have to do with publishing needs. In the case of Last Man, it's because my publisher feels the book title needs to be immediately recognizable as Pride & Prejudice related. This is also why Impulse & Initiative is being renamed Loving Mr. Darcy (no, this was not my choice). This was never an issue when I was posting my stories as JAFF, where everybody already knew they were P&P related. This was also why The Water's Edge had to be renamed Pemberley by the Sea. The short story issue was different. Initially I named it "A Whiff of Darkness" because the story was supposed to fit the theme of sense of smell. I discovered that this title made people read it as a darker story than I intended it to be, to the point where some people didn't understand the ending. Now that it doesn't have to fit a theme anymore, I switched to the new name, and it seems that everybody understands that the ending is happy. So I can see why the right title is important. I do worry that Loving Mr. Darcy is just going to make people focus even more on the sex scenes in I&I, and it seems like that's already the only thing lots of people notice in the story. It gets a little tiring.

Coming up with titles has always been a struggle for me. Occasionally the right title will jump out at me as I'm writing, like The Water's Edge, which came from one particular scene. Other names were practically pulled out of a hat. I decided on From Lambton to Longbourn about a minute before I posted the story because I had to name it something. Originally it had been The Intermediaries, but at the last minute, I lost faith in that title. By Force of Instinct came from a quote that Alison (aams) showed me.

It's easier for me to name my modern stories than my regency fanfics. I think that's because they're more original, and one does eventually run out of titles for JAFF.

Now I should probably go back to Bounds of Decorum, which I'm sure will have to be renamed for publication. I haven't a clue how to work 'Darcy' or 'Pemberley' into that one!