How the Novel Found its Name, Part 2

As I related in my last post, the phrase, "scent of geraniums," has long held a place in my mind... and I was pretty certain that someday I would write a book with just that title: The Scent of Geraniums.

Images usually come first for me when I'm thinking of a new story to write, and this time was no exception:

Geraniums, hanging on a white-beamed porch in the autumn sunlight.

Geraniums, nestled closely together on card-tables in an upstairs room - dark with books and dust.

A piano found its way into that room, as well.

And a dark-haired woman whose fingers danced across the keys as she played hymns.

Another woman, too, but this one entered the story via an old photograph from the 1930s - a bob-haired middle-aged woman, standing between two of her sons - poor, oh-so-very-poor... She could no longer remember a time of real happiness, though she had a worn-out smile pasted on her lips.

And a girl... a teenager wearing a tattered cardigan and flopping shoes... mesmerized by the geraniums on that dark-haired woman's porch.

So the images came together... The plot formed... And three-quarters of the way through, I wasn't quite sure that "The Scent of Geraniums" was the perfect title anymore.

The book had become about so much more, and I wanted the title to convey that, somehow.

So, I played around with words, writing down everything-everything-everything that had anything remotely to do with the book's story, theme, characters, etc.  I ended up with about two dozen real possibilities for a title. Yes, that's right: Two dozen.

After a couple of weeks of tossing the titles over and over, I gave the list to five people and asked them to circle the top three titles that captured their interest - without knowing what anyone else chose. I would pick whatever title rose to the top.

So I thought.

Turns out, when you give a list of two dozen titles to five people, you get very little agreement!

And the choice reverted to me again. I considered The Scent of Geraniums again as the title. But then two people told me it reminded them immediately of a strange movie by a similar name with a different object-of-the-preposition. :-)

Time for a synonym search: And there popped up "fragrance."

Hmm... And that reminded me so strongly of the passage in the Gospels in which the woman pours a jar of expensive perfume over Jesus' feet and wipes them with her hair. And it says, "The fragrance filled the room." {John 12}

And that's what The Fragrance of Geraniums is about: the grace of emptiness before a Lord who suffered in our stead... and the real hope with which He fills us.

So, "The Scent of Geraniums" became The Fragrance of Geraniums.

And I thank the Lord for providing such a fitting name for this story, in just the right time.

If you'd like to see more pictures that have guided/inspired my storytelling journey this time around, I invite you to check out my Pinterest board for The Fragrance of Geraniums... I'm still adding to it, so feel free to follow the board to keep up-to-date. :) Just click on the widget below, and you'll be taken there:

Follow Alicia Roque Ruggieri's board The Fragrance of Geraniums on Pinterest.

Grace and peace,
Alicia

How the Novel Found its Name

My stories usually have titles before they possess a fully-fleshed-out plot. That certainly was the case for this latest one: The Fragrance of Geraniums, releasing in mid-November, Lord willing! :-) Yet that title has evolved since the story's inception...

Do you know what geraniums smell like?

When I was a very little girl, my mother worked part-time as a nurse's assistant for a very elderly man with Parkinson's disease. The man's wife {and primary caregiver} didn't mind at all if my mother brought me along, so I spent a few afternoons each week in their living room, reading The Boxcar Children, or sometimes played on their large property.

The patient's wife - Alana was her name - gave me one of the strongest impressions of my childhood, without meaning to do it, I'm sure. And this is whence the upcoming novel's title comes:

During one winter, Alana asked if I would like to come upstairs to help her with something - I don't remember now what it was. So I traipsed up the steep, ancient staircase behind that spry, white-haired woman. At the top of the stair, we entered a dark but not gloomy hallway, and then Alana led the way into one of the rooms.

That is where I first experienced the scent of geraniums: spicy, unique... as my mother puts it, "not a pretty smell, really."

But an unforgettable one. And I never forgot the smell of that room - the darkened library-room where Alana "wintered" her geraniums - for, in New England, we can't keep our geraniums out year-round. I remember the stubby stalks of all those potted plants, lined up on card-tables, little patches of soil dusting their surfaces. I recall the surprise of realizing that the plants still lived - though Alana had pruned their scarlet blooms and dead bits.

The fragrance of geraniums - more emitting from the plant-part than from the flowers! - filled Alana's library-room, mingling with the musty scent of old books lining the shelves.

And, as a five-or-six-year-old, I felt that I'd been let into a mystery: There was a secret meaning to the scent of geraniums... though I didn't know yet what it was. And that is what the original title of this soon-to-be-released novel was: The Scent of Geraniums... which eventually became The Fragrance of Geraniums. More on that process next time. :-)

Update on The Fragrance of Geraniums' release: I have been editing-editing-editing to get this story to you all with its message of grace clear and lovely. Next is formatting. My Launch Team members should be receiving their review copies shortly - hurrah! :-) -  and then, dear readers - dear patient readers - The Fragrance of Geraniums should release in mid-November!