Forever Sparrow's Song: A Life Between Belonging and Becoming
Working Title: Sparrow’s Song
When a book is traditionally published—whether through one of the Big Five or a small press—it’s often the publisher, not the author, who makes the final decision about the title. I understand the reasoning.
My soon-to-be debut novel is like a child to me. It has been with me now for years, in my waking and in my sleeping. In all that time, the working title has been Sparrow’s Song. I know that isn’t the best title, at least from a marketing perspective. Nothing in the name cues a potential reader that it’s historical fiction, an immigrant’s story, and built on the two nurse training programs established to support the war effort during WWI and WWII.
So, I’m not opposed to changing it for the sake of helping it make its way in the world. But in my heart, it will always be Sparrow’s Song, and here’s why…
My protagonist, Kathryn, is among the group of Germans from Russia who immigrated to Nebraska as children early in the twentieth century. Her mother refers to her and her sister—at odds as the story opens—as Meine Kleine Spatzen—my little sparrows. As younger children—just like sparrows who “eat in a bunch to keep each other safe,”—the two girls looked out for each other, but not so much anymore. And there’s deeper symbolism in the title, too, about a protagonist who only wants the same advantages as the native-born young women in her community.
Here’s an example:
Kathryn smiled. How lucky she was to have Arthur as a friend.
“I’m sure she was referring to the common type [of sparrow] that a person can see anywhere, just by going outdoors,” she said. “You have the same ones here in Gleason that we have back home in Nebraska.”
“You mean the kind that sweep for food with their beaks instead of scratching with their feet like chickens?”
Kathryn’s thoughts flew home, to sparrows feeding by the chicken house while her mother worked in the garden. “I guess so.”
“Some contend that’s not even a sparrow, but a weaver finch,” he said. “Introduced from Europe sometime in the mid-1800s, so non-native, or at least not related to any of the American sparrows. Once it got going, though, it spread like a spilled cup of coffee. It’s an aggressive species, competing with native birds for food and nesting places. Some,” he said, the glow from the car dials lighting up his broad grin, “have even called it a menace.”
Kathryn smiled. “So, what you’re telling me,” she grinned, “is that my mother’s Spatzen are successful immigrants. They want what the native birds have, and they take what they want without apology. And maybe they make some other birds uncomfortable along the way.”
I’m not a birder, but I’m a birding admirer. I own half a dozen bird-adjacent books and a decent pair of binoculars. The nuthatch, with its zygodactyl feet—perfect for walking headfirst down tree trunks—is my favorite backyard visitor, though don’t ask me to identify the exact type. I live just fifteen miles from a major migratory stop for sandhill cranes, and earlier this year I paid $100 to visit a prairie chicken lek and watch those avian dancers absorbed in their springtime rituals.
Arthur, one of the important secondary characters in my story, is a birder. I’ve included a birding scene that was great fun to write and, among others, a reference to the hundreds of thousands of Sandhill cranes that stop along the Platte River to rest and feed on their way to Canada.
So yes, I understand why the title might need to change, and I’ll support a new title that helps the book find its way in the world.
But in my heart, it will always be Sparrow’s Song.