Friday, February 28, 2014

Character names

I'm drawing today's blog inspiration from the list of 101 Blog Post Ideas for Writers. Let me know if you do the same!

Today's topic: Character names
I used to spend hours coming up with the perfect character names. I’d look at baby name websites and keep lists of my favorites. I’d find a meaning to match my character’s personality.

Now? I’m lazy. Or I’m more preoccupied with plotting/outlining. Or I’m desperate to come up with some type of story 24 hours before my workshop. So character names get put on the back burner. Lately, I’ve pulled a lot of my stories from real life experiences and I just slap characters with the same names as the people I’ve based them on, convinced I’ll go back and change them when I have time. And then I just never do, and I become accustomed to typing their name and don’t want to change it. It’s a problem. I’m going to have so many people suing me if I get published.

How do you pick names for your characters?

4 comments:

  1. I'm still a spend-hours-on-baby-name-websites gal. It's funny, though: with my MCs, the names usually pop into my head randomly and then it's like I can't even imagine those characters as anyone else. It's the supporting cast that I end up spending forever on, though I do make sure to research meanings for everyone. :)

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    1. That's how you know the MC's name is perfect, when you can't imagine them as anyone else! :)

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  2. I am totally lazy. I picked an A for a girl and a B for a boy and then C for their last name and D for the other last name and so on. I might start out with a and b for first names and y and z for last names. I mean it-I am LAZY. So, Amanda Brown and Charlie Davis and Anne Zimmer and Bobby Wilson become great characters because I didn't worry too much over their names!!! hahahaa!

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    1. I've done something similar to that before, too. "GIRL" and "BOY" and "MOM" and "DAD". They get real names eventually! Although it might be interesting to read a book with labels like that as names instead...

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