Have you considered just omitting the "Next: Agatha Heterodyne and the..." teaser from volume 6, and coming up with a title later on?

Personally, my first encounter with that naming scheme was in the Berenstein Bears books when I was a kid. It's always just sort of made sense to me. But I do fondly remember the Tom Swift books, too, and that makes a lot of sense for the adventurous structure of the story.

I hope this means that Book 6 is imminent? (Please?)

I remember the Tom Swift books. And the Harry Potter connection didn't even occur to me...
In fact, now I have to go find Tom Swift books and reread them. I remember them fondly from my early childhood, and you've mentioned them one too many times.

I keep forgetting that the most recent generation of kids didn't do much reading before Harry Potter...

I never read Tom Swift, but my dad had a stack of them next to the Hardy Boys ones (which I DID read - and hey, did anyone else here ever read the "Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators" books?).

And for the record, you could call the next book "Agatha Heterodyne's Mudslide of Doom" and I'd buy it regardless.

So it isn't going to be called Agatha Heterodyne and the Deathly Hallows" after all?

I'm sure you will think of something in that Castle that is deserving. If all else fail, there is always "... and the Self-Aware Castle".

Consider that a mark to surpass. (Please)

I thought the source of format was obvious, but then, the Hetrodyne Stories' source is clear. (He said, transparently.)

And BTW ... *Nudge* RSS? *nudge* I know I sent you email yesterday as an opening salvo to dealing with the Buck Godot and What's New rss issues.

The Repeletron. That's the gizmo that sticks in my head.

I've read Harry Potter but never any Tom Swift books, and that still never occurred to me. I think the boys' adventure story antecedents are clear (especially when we get a look at Gil's library of Heterodyne books). Titles of the "So-and-so and the Something Cool" pattern have pretty thoroughly worked their way into the cultural background as a marker of adventure stories. Harry Potter might be the first connection that a younger reader makes; I think if someone had asked me what it made me think of I'd have come up with either a general comment on older kids books that I haven't read or with Indiana Jones.

Agatha Heterodyne and the Big Explosion. There's bound to be one somewhere.

My dad had Tom Swift (obvious lead in drug to Sci Fi/Fantasy), but before that he had the Jerry Todd/Poppy Ott books (the obvious lead in drug to Tom Swift). After wading through those I got into the Three Investigators books. It took awhile before I was allowed at my Dad sci fi collection (Mostly old Arkham House).

Agatha Heterodyne and the Norman Rockwell Plagiarism.

I expect you also get emails saying, "Hey! Those signs in the Mechanicsburg double-spread were stolen from other people's comics!"

I love the subtitling. It makes me think of Encyclopedia Brown as well as the Tom Swift, Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew et al. previously mentioned.

This pattern goes back at least to the Sherlock Holmes story names, though there the (super-)titling is only implied. Can anybody antedate Arthur Conan Doyle?

I vote for Agatha Heterodyne and The Purple Ointment of Doom!

I know it isn't historically accurate, but for me the "real" source of that titling pattern will always be the Indiana Jones movies. I had my first exposure to them as a kid, and I thought it was a much better way to name sequels than just tacking a number on the end.

The idea that you had copied the titling format never occurred to me. It's the format used in virtually every epic adventure and/or mystery-solving series I've ever enjoyed. And I'm always amused at how Harry Potter fans think everything rips off HP, when it's the other way around. Harry will never replace The Worst Witch in my heart.

Hi! I'm a new reader of your excellent series, and I can't restrain myself from not making a little greeting and remark on how joyful I am at finding something so extensive and dynamic in a steampunk fantasy setting--my favourite, for certain. You, and your co-creator and inkists and colourists and everyone else who contributes and works on Girl Genius, are very inspiring people. I am :very: glad I came across this comic, it has given me the 'creative boost' to start my own dabblings again as well as providing me a rather lovely archive to go through...uhm, twice.

So, yes. Thank you, and I'm looking forward to more! (And buying dead tree format to cherish and be territorial over.)

I was tempted to just paste the picture in here but didn't want to hurt anyone's bandwidth, but if you haven't seen this you really must:

A Mimmoth!

(Note: just click the link, don't Open in New Window, unless you want to sort through about 80 other really cool transmogrified animal pictures!)4

I read Tom Swift when I was a kid (though I think it was the Juniors series as a previous poster noted). I enjoyed them, but I like the stuff you and Phil create a lot more :)

Light and laughter,
SongCoyote

I didn't think of the Tom Swift series, but I didn't think of Harry Potter either. Anyone who thinks that titling stories that way was a farm-fresh idea of JK Rowling's has seriously got to read more.

I hope you're not considering abandoning the Agatha Heterodyne and the Intriguing Reference pattern. I think it really fits well with the tone of the work.

No one remembers Commander Cody and the Radar Men on the Moon? The old Republic serials were always titled in that form:

Protagonist and the [Antagonist and/or Place/Object/Event of Interest]

Agatha Heterodyne frequently modulated. A referance to FM radio.
Or Agatha Heterodyne...SUPER HETERODYNE....amply modulated?

Then again with this being steam punk, Agatha Heterodyne chips a tooth, Agatha Heterodyne and the differential drive! Agatha Heterodyne drops her gear? Agatha Heterodyne Strips a gear
Agatha Heterodyne and the Acme screw?...Interrupted screw? Wyl E Coyote referance
Agatha Heterodyne and The mechanicsburg incident?

I better stop now before I get hit with something .....very large that goes MEEP! MEEP!

Its not so evil being this easy!

How about "Agatha Heterodyne and the Secret of Mechanicsburg"? Everyone would be like "No! There are no hints to content! I must buy the book to know the secret!" ;P

never even considered that you were borrowing from HP...

however, how about "Agatha Heterodyne and the Gigantic Mimmoths"

jim