I have been working on an epic sci-fi novel for almost two-and-a-half years.
I have wanted to write something sci-fi for a long time now. While I love epic fantasy, Steampunk, and my conscious reality creation blog, sci-fi is my first love.
When I was a small child, maybe four or five years old, I used to pretend that I was the captain or the helmsman of a starship. I have vague memories of sitting at the living-room windowsill, pretending to fly through epic battles and explore uncharted space. I’d sit on the swing in my backyard, flying my starfighter across the stars. I expanded the Star Wars Universe by telling epic tales through my action figures.
Star Wars, the original Battlestar Galactica, and Buck Rogers were part of my early sci-fi experience, and opened my imagination. My first finished story was arguably a dystopian sci-fi tale, but I followed it with an epic sci-fi adventure, which I never finished.
Even though I honed my fantasy writing, and in time my Steampunk works, I have still dabbled in sci-fi over the years. There are several half-finished and half-started sci-fi ideas in my documents folder, some just an idea, some a few pages, one or two even go a bit deeper than that. But nothing held my attention long enough to write to completion.
While skimming social media, I came across a random meme that put an idea in my head. That sparked the epic sci-fi universe I have been working with since September of 2015. I have created something I am having a ton of fun writing, and I might finally be nearing the end.
The thing is, I still haven’t found a title for it.
That being said, I am turning to you for assistance.
What should I name my epic sci-fi work?
Let me provide a little background about the universe I am creating. Maybe you can help me to figure out what I should call this thing.
- The humans are not originally from Earth.
- The alien races are not all bipeds like humans. While many of the alien races are sexually compatible, they cannot interbreed.
- There are intergalactic organizations to handle certain matters. These include:
- The Hypercomm Arts and Entertainment Networks (The HAEN). Broadcast channels across hyperspace of news, entertainment, sports and other information. The Hypercomm Arts and Entertainment Agency is the business behind the HAEN.
- Almost every technologically advanced world has an infonet. These, in turn, are usually connected to an Interplanetary Cyberspace Infonet, which in turn is usually connected to the Hypercomm and its Virtual Data Infonet, which is also connected to the HAEN.
- Intergalactic Credit Exchange (The ICE). A banking system that maintains money across the galaxy, easing intergalactic trade.
- The Cosmic Security Agency (CSA). An intergalactic police force, allowed by treaty to operate across almost every human sector and most non-human sectors. Limited authority with certain particular exceptions. They are like a combination of the CIA, FBI, DEA, and a mercenary army.
- A good deal of the story centers around the crew of a starship called the Dawnstrider, which is more-or-less a freighter, performing legal trade and shipping across the galaxy.
- A portion of the story centers around another starship. However, the crew of the Ravusquan Raider (the Ravusq are one of my alien species) generally works with black markets and items stolen or, shall we say, redirected.
- I have created an alien race with no gender. As such, I have created gender-neutral pronouns for them.
Even more details from my epic sci-fi novel.
While I describe in some detail what the alien species look like, I leave my humans almost completely non-descript. Part of the reason for this is because I want the reader to imagine the people however they wish. Also, if this ever got made into a movie, ANYBODY could be cast into any role.- Most of the hand-held weapons are a combination sword or dagger and energy weapons. Swords and daggers convert into laser rifles and laser pistols. I mostly did this because I envisioned a cool aesthetic as such. Plus, this weaves an element of fantasy into this sci-fi.
- I am breaking or ignoring certain tropes of the genre. For example, one of the main characters of this story is a middle-aged Human lesbian woman.
- Galactic sectors range from single solar systems to dozens of them. Some are ruled by democratic governments, some by monarchies, and almost anything you can think of in between. Even some of the non-human races divide into different governmental entities.
- Faster-than-light travel is mostly through hyperspace, though I have woven in wormhole travel and warp-bubble travel, too.
Thus far, it’s proving to be a pretty epic story. As I am beginning to find an end to this in sight, I really hope to dream up a name.
Help me Not-Obi-Wan Kenobi, I need a title!
SO, this is where I am asking for your help. Please respond to this post with any name ideas you might have. If your idea inspires the title of this epic, you will receive an advance copy of this work (probably pre-edited).
If you offer a reasonable suggestion for a title but it still does not resonate with me, you will receive a preview of the story (also likely pre-edited).
For more than two years I have been unable to settle on a title. The time has come to crowdsource an idea.
I want to thank you in advance for your assistance. Keep watching for pre-launch information for this epic story!
After more than 6 years of regular blogging at The Ramblings of The Titanium Don, I have launched a Patreon to garner support for my writing works, and more.
Follow me here!
It’s tough to come up with a name that’s reflective of the entire series, given just the summary provided. I’m going to assume that the items you highlighted are really the underlying tenants of the whole epic.
is this a single novel, or is your idea to have multiples like you’ve written in the past? in other words, do you need a title for the overall arc, and then individual titles for the books within that – or just a single title for the single book?
I would think that naming it after a singular important item or event would make sense, but again, not able to do that with just a summary, so really flying blind here.