Tag: #Names

What’s In A Name? #OpenBook Blog Hop

  By Open Book

Feb 5, 2024

How do you choose your characters’ names?

Names are a funny thing.

Hardly anyone I know is happy with the one gifted to them by their parents, and many people go by a nickname. We are writers may have picked our own. (We talked about pen names last week.)  And in many traditions, names hold power. So, how do we pick the right ones for our characters?

Let’s start with my minor characters. I actually put more work into them.

First, I have to figure out what their role in the story is in relationship to the main character. Are they going to be a supporter? A romantic interest? Or the villain? Then I try to pick a name that fits that role. The bad guys/gals get assigned harsher sounding names with more consonants and guttural sounds. The romantic interests are given one that is smoother and more pleasing to the ear.

I used to attempt to make sure the name didn’t belong to a real person by changing the spelling, but I’ve given that up. There’s lots of people with non-traditional spellings, and it’s become a futile effort. Of course, I include a statement when I publish a story that all characters are figments of my imagination.

The other criteria I use is trying to include names with different ethnic backgrounds. The internet is a great help in the search. Yes, it can take me down the proverbial rabbit hole, but that’s half the fun.

Then there’s the list I accumulated during my last job of interesting names I ran across. It gets used for characters that add ‘color’ to the story. Ones that appear for maybe a brief passage or a chapter or two and never are heard of again. Or I might borrow a name from a book on the bookshelf that’s less than an arm lengths away.

That leaves the main characters.

They’re a different process. As the idea for a story works around in my head, the main characters name themselves. Sometimes I’ll hear a name in a song while driving down the road and it just fits. Other times I’ll wake up in the morning with a realization of the perfect name for a major character. I don’t the foggiest idea where the name “Harmony Duprie” came from, but I grew to love it while writing the Harmony Duprie Mysteries. Jake, who appears in those same books, was supposed to be a throwaway character. He didn’t even have a last name for most of the first book. (I’ve told that story before. He wasn’t supposed to be a continuing character, but wouldn’t leave me alone.) And Eli got his first name from a song.

How do the other authors on this hop name their characters? Find out by following the links below. 

As always, until next time, please stay safe.

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Feb 5, 2024

How do you choose your characters’ names?

 

It’s All In The Name #OpenBook Blog Hop

  By Open Book

May 16, 2022

How do you come up with the names for your characters?

Shakespeare wrote “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet.”

There’s a lot in a name and we all know it. I won’t get into the ways that social/economic/political factors can be influenced by names, but I will acknowledge they make a difference in the way I name my characters. I try to make my good guys sound like good guys, and my bad guys like villains. How do I do that?

It’s the way the names ‘sound.’ Although American English draws from many languages, some sounds are more pleasing to the ear. For example, think about the contrast between the ‘hard’ c and the ‘soft’ c. Which is easier on the ear? Chaos or celery? So, my villains may have names that use ‘hard’ sounds while my heroes have softer names. Gertrude vs Sarah, for example.

But where do I find my names? I’ve got a variety of sources. For one, I keep a notebook with unusual names that I run into. I have pages of nothing but names, both first and last. Most of them I use for minor characters because my major characters often name themselves. But I try to come up with names that aren’t found in social media or in a google search. I do this by changing one or two characters in the name.

For Wolves’ Pawn, I used the US census from the 1700s and 1800s as a source for some of my last names. I wanted to give the wolf packs a historical feel, to show they had been on their lands for a long time. I’m probably the only one who is aware of it, but now you are in on the secret! Most of the first names were more modern, to make the characters more comfortable for the readers.

The names continued in Wolves’ Knight, but Wolves’ Gambit changed geographic locations, I switched the basis for names to reflect the difference in the packs’ backgrounds. I drew heavily on minor biblical names, but changed them to be familiar without being the actual names. My intent was to mimic the way language shifts happen in isolated populations.

Names in the Harmony Duprie Mysteries are different. I wanted to use names that could be found in any small town in the northeast USA. That gave me a wide range of options because my small town reflected the diversity of the area. As my cast of background characters grew across the series, I had to make sure I didn’t repeat a name accidentally, and my notebook came into play.

The notebook has been used for other thing—scribblings with ideas for plots, revisions, general notes—, and I’m running out of pages. It’s about time to retire it and start a new one. Maybe one of those nice ones that I hate to use because I should save them? (Don’t ask me save them for what. I don’t have a good answer.)

How do our other authors get their characters’ names? Just follow the links below to find out. And, as always, until next time, please stay safe.

 

May 16, 2022

How do you come up with the names for your characters?

Rules:
1. Link your blog to this hop.
2. Notify your following that you are participating in this blog hop.
3. Promise to visit/leave a comment on all participants’ blogs.
4. Tweet/or share each person’s blog post. Use #OpenBook when tweeting.
5. Put a banner on your blog that you are participating.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

 

It’s All In the Name Open Book Blog Hop

Link

  By Open Book

June 24, 2019

How do you select the names of your characters?

A long time ago, I was introduced to the concept that some cultures hold that names hold power. Different cultures interpret that in different ways, but I have used the idea to help come up with the names of my characters.

But there are a number of other factors that come into play. I previously worked a job where I dealt with names. Every know and then, I’d run across one that was just so unique I had to explore its background. And the really cool ones I’d write down in a notebook to refer to later. I’d never use a someone’s whole name for a character, but the process gave me some cool first and last names.

Speaking of not using real names, Google is my friend. When I come up with a name, I search to see if it belongs to a real person. If it does, and I really want to use the name, I’ll change the spelling of the name. Sure, I can’t avoid using someone’s real name once in a while, but I cover that with the copyright statement.

I also try to uses names as an indicator of ethnic background. (You know that research I referred to earlier? That’s where it comes into play.) In my first book, Wolves’ Pawn, I decided my main character would have a Native American background. That led me to research traditional names for members of various tribes. That’s where Dot, the main character in Wolves’ Pawn,  last name come from.

In Wolves’ Gambit, I dealt with feuding wolf-shifter packs. Because they limited their contact with the outside world, I decided to use old-fashioned names for one of the packs. On top of that, I used alternative spellings.

But sometimes a name just comes to me. That’s what happened with Harmony Durpie, the main character in my mystery series. I don’t know where it came from, it was a name that found me. Eli, on the other hand, came to me because I was listening to the song “Eli’s coming” one day when I was writing!

One thing I try really hard to watch for is that I don’t give characters names that use same first letter. That makes it easier for readers to keep them straight. I do make exceptions though-calling twins similar names, for example.

I will admit to using the names of people I’ve met once in a while. I enjoy naming my villains with the names of people I don’t like. Of course, I still disguise the names so they can’t be connected to real-life people.

I haven’t used any of the name  generators that are out there-yet. What I do refer to are the baby-name sites that exist. If I have an idea for a name, they help me narrow down my choices based on sex and ethnic background.

The truth is, I never know where the next name will come from. I ran across one recently that I need to add to my list of potential names Liam. It’s been around for a while, but I ‘found” it again recently. Which makes me wonder if it will show up in my next book!

Now, let’s check out all the other authors to see how they name their characters.

June 24, 2019

How do you select the names of your characters?

Rules:

1. Link your blog to this hop.

2. Notify your following that you are participating in this blog hop.

3. Promise to visit/leave a comment on all participants’ blogs.

4. Tweet/or share each person’s blog post. Use #OpenBook when tweeting.

5. Put a banner on your blog that you are participating.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

https://fresh.inlinkz.com/p/e7beb9483e3443fc80bcef612ea7da0a