Can You Use Song Titles in a Novel?

Yes—usually. Song titles are generally safer to mention in a novel than lyrics, and the sharper risk begins when the text starts borrowing the song’s protected expression rather than just naming it.

That distinction matters because a title can sit in a scene like a match on a table: visible, loaded, but not yet lit. A character can hear a chorus from the next room, remember a title at 4AM, or let a song name surface as evidence without turning the page into a copy of the music. Copyright guidance points to the same boundary: names and titles are not protected in the way the underlying expression is, which is why lyric quotation draws more caution than a title alone.

In a mystery, that difference can do real work. A song title can mark a witness, time a disappearance, or return as the only thing everyone remembers from a recording that is no longer there. The title becomes a clue, not a quotation. The atmosphere stays intact. The reader feels the pull of something heard, not fully recovered.

That is part of the logic behind Cassie Hour: a villa, a missing recording, and the hour that keeps returning. It moves like a file found at the edge of the story—one where music is never just mood, and the chorus may matter because it was heard, not because it was repeated.

If you are reading for the mystery itself, start with the novel: Cassie Hour. If you are following the sound of the story first, the song waits nearby.