It's Expository Title Time!

Remember back in the Good Ol' Days™, when one had to actually read a book to find out what it might be about? When the title gave little or no clue regarding what you'd find within? Like A Clockwork Orange, or Nineteen Eighty-Four, or Lord of the Flies?

Those days are gone, folks! In today's Modern Society™, a busy Hausfrau has no time to dilly-dally over books whose meanings cannot be discerned instantaneously!

We here at Judge a Book By Its Cover are proud to bring you today's edition, featuring Harlequin Romance's line of self-explanatory expository titles, all seen by Maughta and me while we hit the grocery store this evening to stock up for our New Year's Eve soirée tomorrow night. The first course is Italian Boss, Housekeeper Bride:

Without having read the book, I'd guess that's our Italian hero on the left. He's likely the boss. I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that at some point in our novel's denouement he's going to marry his housekeeper. That's probably her, on the right. Why they're consummating their marriage on the set of some low-budget 1970s' porno film, I dunno: the title gives no clue.

While we're on the subject of Italian romance heroes, what's better than a swarthy Levantine adonis with a ripped bod and gorgeous dark hair? How about a swarthy Levantine adonis with a ripped bod, gorgeous dark hair, and a shitload of personal worth?

As to the title: might we leave anything to the imagination? Whatever happened to subtlety, understatement, metaphor? Can we try to entice our readers with a hint of mystery, a soupçon of suspense? A well-chosen title can be quite a draw. I mean, would anyone have read Watership Down if it were called The Internecine Warring of a Bunch of Rabbits?

Once again, I'm betting that Giacomo, on the left, is Italian. And he's probably rich as Croesus, but inexplicably unhappy. The chick on the left danced into his life around Christmas time and got stuffed into the stocking he'd hung by the chimney with care. Now her zipper's stuck.

I wonder if he gets off on being called a "naughty elf."

Not to be outdone by the Italians, the Greeks have thrown a billionaire of their own into the mix:

Another Mediterranean Mammon, another lucky bride. At least in this case there is a scintilla of ambiguity in the title: what role does the baby play in the revenge? Has this here gold-digger had a baby by Aristotle Rastapopulos in order to blackmail him into marriage, or has the couple's one-year-old, sick to death of strained peas and early bedtimes, contrived to get the better of his hapless parents? Read on, to find out!

Until next time, your homework: come up with literal, expository titles for your favorite literary classics (ex.: Obsessive-Compulsive Sailor Goes After Big Whale).

Oh, yeah, and happy New Year!