Finding the title

Finding the title for Mine to Avenge wasn’t easy. It took me a long time to settle on a title, not finding one I was happy with until the novel was almost complete. The search began by exploring many different quotes about vengeance, being one of the central themes of the novel. I quickly found the following quote from Winston Churchill and settled on it for the first page of the novel:

 ‘Nothing is more costly, nothing is more sterile, than vengeance.’

The sentiment expressed in this quote encapsulates the thoughts of one of my central characters when he makes some personal discoveries as to the nature of vengeance and how it is perpetuated. I was writing from that particular character’s point of view at the time and the quote served as a springboard for some imagery I used to flesh out the thought a bit more.

However, I then spent many months playing with the quote - deconstructing it and trying to piece it together in different ways - trying to come up with a catchy title, but to no avail. I went back again to the quotes I had collected but had no success.

It was only when I was writing a scene towards the end of the story that the title finally came to me. I was writing of a showdown between two major characters when I suddenly remembered one of the most famous quotes of all to do with vengeance - “ ‘Vengeance is mine; I will repay,’ says the Lord.”

Taking care not to give away any plot spoilers, this quote described the essence of the showdown between the two characters, and the title was suddenly very clear to me - Mine to Avenge.