‘The Pirates of Sausalito’ Or Maybe ‘Pirates? In Sausalito?’ Help Me Decide

by | Apr 1, 2024 | Pirates of Sausalito

I’m publishing my fourth novel this spring and I’m still vacillating about its title. Maybe you can help. 

In January, I published an advance reader copy for beta readers with the title The Pretend Pirates of Sausalito: Houseboat Wars Murder Mystery True Story. Based on their feedback, I’m leaning now toward taking out “Pretend” in the title and “True Story” in the subtitle. That makes the title The Pirates of Sausalito: Houseboat Wars Murder Mystery. I’m also considering Pirates? In Sausalito? Or Pirates in Sausalito? 

The book is fiction, but based on true events, during the 1970s “houseboat wars” in Sausalito. Hippies and artists living on houseboats in a ramshackle shantytown face off against city leaders and developers who want to build a luxury harbor on the waterfront, and when the police attempt to evict them, they fight back with street theater, civil disobedience, and monkey-wrenching. Then someone gets stabbed.

Here are my options: my current title, which I’m abandoning, and three new possibilities.

   
   

P.S. I’ve been percolating on some tag lines as well, which I may use in the book description on the back cover, on vendor sites like Amazon or even on the front cover.

Here are two of them. I’d love to hear what you think.

  1. Not a True Story, But Based on True Events
  2. Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test meets Murder, She Wrote