Okay, Listen Here

Okay, Listen Here

Monday, May 21, 2012

The Pain in a Name


People often ask if writing collaboratively ever causes dissension . Miraculously, the answer is no, not for us. Generally, we are of the same mind. When we are not, we recognize when the other knows best. Usually.

But there was this one time, and it was all over a name.

Many times, the characters just name themselves—at least the first name. We just know the name, like we know that he detests wine or that she is afraid of storms. But sometimes, they are a little stubborn and we have to name them.

So this one time. . . .  We were about to introduce a secondary character who was going to go on to be a hero in the next book. We spent a long time designing the scene—you know,  telling what happened as concisely as possible, writing the dialogue, describing the sun steaks in his hair and making sure it was understood he got those streaks from actually being in the sun. No chemical streaks for him, not our guy.  Now it was time for me to go to the keyboard and put it on paper.

"One more thing," I said to her. "What's his name? Do you care?"
"I don't care," she said.

So then I did what I always do. I opened my file of the alphabetical list of people already in the world we had created. This is necessary, because I learned the hard way that I love me an "L" name above all others. I am also mighty fond of a "K". If I don't look at a list, we will be living in  the land of "L" and "K".

Well, this time I had been careful about the "K's" so that was a possibility. Then, for the first name, I got out The Character Naming Sourcebook by Sherriyn Kenyon and my four baby naming books. For the last name, I reached for the Junior League, church, and Decatur Assembly directories and my file of programs from graduations, sporting events, and various awards presentations.

I was set. Pretty soon, secondary character, soon to be hero, high school football coach, who would have gone to the NFL had he not torn up his knee, was named Keith Hamilton. Did I say pretty soon? That's a lie. It took a while. And I don't even do any of that nonsense like looking up the meaning of names to match attributes of the character. I just don't think parents sit around and think, "My boy's going to be untamed so I'm going to name him Damien."

Anyway.  I wrote the scene. Sent it to her. She called.

"His name is not Keith Hamilton!" I hadn't seen her so vehement since the time I had the captain of the guard in one of our elf fantasies build a fire in the heroine's parlor. "Keith Hamilton is not a hero's name. It's the name of an ice skater."

Okay, so I recognize that some names are not hero names. Jerry. Billy. Earl. Donny Lynn. Robby, unless it’s a period piece set in Scotland. But Keith Hamilton? What about that makes you think ice skater?

Besides, I knew she didn't know the single name of a real ice skater. She doesn't even watch ice skating. I am the one who likes ice skating, and as far as I knew, there were no ice skaters named Keith Hamilton.

"You said you didn't care," I reminded her, all the time thinking of how I'd poured over my books and cross checked names, even looked at the most popular name list for the year he was born.

"I don't care," she said. "Except not Keith Hamilton."

"All right, then," I challenged her. "What is his name?" I knew she didn't have any of the books; they were all at my house.

She thought for a minute, probably less. Okay, certainly less. "Nathan Scott," she said.  

And there it was. Nathan Scott lives. Keith Hamilton skated off.

Do you labor over choosing names for your characters? Or when you named your children, did it come easily?


36 comments:

  1. LOL! I love R and S names. But sometimes the secondary characters become overwhelmed by a certain letter, so their names all start with the letter A, or something like that. Don't know why. So I keep a list of all the characters named in the book, too, so I can spot trends like that.

    The hard part about hero and heroine names is, you don't get to name them; you have to find out what their names are. And sometimes they don't want to tell you, which tells ME I don't know enough about them yet to know their names. So I have to think about them. I think about what they look like (in my mind, certain names are brunette names, and certain names are blond names; I would never name a brunette "Carolyn," for instance, because to me that's a blond name even though I know some brunette Carolyns. It is what it is.) I go over and over the baby name books, of which I have a multitude. And, eventually, something starts clicking. Then I see The Name. And, I swear, I see it in bold print, and highlighted, apart from the rest of the text. It's The Name. It can't be changed. Whether I like it or not, that's the character's name.

    And sometimes I know the name right away.

    Keith Hamilton. Scott Hamilton is the ice skater. So Keith Hamilton became Nathan . . . Scott. Still an ice skater.

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    1. Thanks for pointing the similarity to Scott Hamilton, Maven Linda. I was about to do that. Lol!

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    2. Scott may still be an ice skater but somehow Scott as a last name seems different. At then end of the day y'all are correct that it is still an ice skater's name.

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  2. Yes, I suspect that the reason Stephanie was so sure that Nathan's was not Keith is because she knew a lot more about him than I did at the time. He was more her creation than mine.

    Another of our heroes, Luke Avery, was mine from the beginning and there was never any doubt what his name was. I don't think I even went to the books. (Yeah, an L name.)

    That's funny about the ice skaters. I can't wait to see what she says about that. Maybe the next name she picks will be Brian Kurt.

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  3. I look in obituaries and do the alphabetical file for each book as well. I love the character naming source book. And as soon as I read Keith Hamilton's name and Stephanie's response, I totally agreed. Weird!

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    1. How about Nathan? Is that a hero's name. But even if it isn't, it is now. It's his name. But not Milton. No hero Miltons.

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  4. I like Nathan. And Nate. I have seen that in CRs--strong manly name. Milton? Not so much....

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  5. I like names with the K or X sound in them -- Jack, Max, Luke, Jake, Nick, Alex.

    Naming the kids was a collaborative effort. If it was a boy, he got to pick the first name and I picked the middle name. It it was a girl, the process was reversed. But neither could force a name the other didn't like. With both boys we had several names picked out and then waited to see what name each boy looked like. We decided #1 son didn't look like an Eric and #2 son didn't look like a Will or a Marc. I never did get to use the name Kate.

    I use the phone book for names too. And the birth announcements in the paper.

    Marilyn

    P.S. Can Keith do a quadruple salchow or a triple Axel? ;-)

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    1. Oh, Marilyn. I don't know what Keith can do. He's gone with the ice. I like to think he can land a quad of some kind.

      Could a hero be an figure skater? Probably not.

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    2. If he was a former hockey player forced to skate in figure skating events, then probably. ;)

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    3. I am pretty sure that it would be really, really hard for me to ever see an figure skater as a hero. I am sure it could be done but I think it would be extremely difficult.

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  6. I too pour over books for names. I have a tendency to like names that are old fashioned and with meaning. I don't necessarily have any alphabet character preference. But I do "see" the name when it's right. And it "feels" like a puzzle piece, completing the picture.

    Funny thing, the names we picked for the kids are attributes they both carry. Did they become that or were they made thataway? I don't know. But I find it intriguing.

    And I saw the ice skater correlation right away, too. It made me giggle! :D

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    1. She also hates Melanie Hamilton almost as much as she hates Ashley Wilkes.

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    2. Hating Melanie Hamilton and Ashley Wilkes? Hmmm... I'm not sure how I feel about that, since I was named after Melanie in GWTW! LOL!

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    3. My children are named after characters in GWTW too. Beau is a nickname we use for our oldest, for Scarlet's beaus and Leigh is D2's middle name after Vivian Leigh.

      I love Melanie and Ashley Wilkes, though Ashley was a wus.

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    4. Melanie, I like YOU but that Melanie in GWTW was mealy mouthed! Oh, I know she could drag a sword down off the mantle and creep to the stairs but at the end of the day if they had been depending on her for defense it would have gone very, very, badly. Don't even get me started on that wimpy Ashley!

      Kathy, I think the names are lyrical and Mrs. Leigh was certainly a character unto herself.

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    5. I love your kids' names too, Kathy!

      You know, in the book, Melanie was a very strong-willed character, but she was quiet and played by the rules. In some ways she was much stronger than Scarlet. But if you want respect and to get your way in this world, be a Scarlet. Don't be a Melanie! Although things didn't end up all that well for Scarlet, either. Hmmm...

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    6. And yes, Ashley was a horrible wus. Ugh. He was awful. Worse even than Edmund, the hero in Jane Austen's Mansfield Park. He makes me mad.

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  7. Jean, it varies for me. Usually I know the hero and heroine's names and don't have to stew over them, or not for very long. But I do like to look through census lists online for the time period and geographical area of my setting. Since I write historicals, this is important to me, that a character's name actually be a name that existed during that time and place. But for my latest WIP I wanted to name my hero Colin. He's from England in the early 1400's, so I looked up census lists from that time period, and lo and behold, there really was no Colin. I did find that I could name him Col. But Colin was more of a pet name for Col. No, I didn't like that. So I mentioned it to two of my writer friends who also write historicals and are also sticklers for historical accuracy. I said, "I really want to name him Colin, but that wasn't really in existence, probably, during the early 1400's." They both said, "So? It's fiction! Go ahead and name him Colin if you want to." I was so shocked. I couldn't believe they would encourage me to sin against historical accuracy like that!

    But in the end, I decided I would. So his name is Colin le Wyse. Don't you love that name? Even if it may not be historically accurate? (The last name is, BTW.)

    True story. I decided to name a character Peter Brunckhorst in my first pubbed novel, The Healer's Apprenice. Peter was historically accurate to 1300's Germany, and Brunckhorst was a Germany surname that I thought sounded particularly interesting. I looked it up. It wasn't actually known when it originated, so it may or may not have existed in the 1300's, but I decided to go with it, since in the story, the guy actually invented the name. It wasn't his real name.

    Lo and behold (I seem to be partial to this phrase today) I get an email a few months after The Healer's Apprentice was released and the email was from PETER BRUNCKHORST!!! My villain from The Healer's Apprentice! I thought, OMG, someone hated my story and is pretending to be my villain and writing me a hate e-mail! But it wasn't. It was a real guy named Peter Brunckhorst who lived in one of the New England states, and he was doing research on his family's genealogy and wanted to know what I knew about the history of the Brunckhorst name. I didn't tell him where I found the name (off the back of a package of ham) but I had to admit to him that I didn't believe the name was actually in existence in the 1300's, when my story was set. He hadn't been able to find it that far back either, which is why he emailed me.

    And that is the story of how my villain emailed me. Very "Stranger Than Fiction"-y.

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    1. Melanie I love that story! Historical writers have a little more trouble. I understand there are some readers who will crucify over and incorrect fact.

      Some I loved about writing the elf stories: we made everything up. I know elven marriage rituals inside out because I made it up.

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    2. LOL! Well, Jean (or is it Stephanie?) I do try my utter best to get my facts right, but if I ever fudge anything, I always get caught!

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    3. Great story! Thanks for sharing it with us! That is so funny that you found the name on a package of lunch meat while he was hoping for some documentation.

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    1. Not only was it long, but it was a little confusing and had multiple typos. Sorry!!!

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    2. What a fantastic story, Melanie. I love that!

      Staying true to period names can keep you on your toes. But also making sure those names were in existence where your characters lived. What's good in the US, may not work in England and so forth.

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  9. My characters like to change their names. I may start with a hero's name then he let's me know he doesn't like it. LOL

    I do not like AAashley Wilkes - weak-willed spineless...I digress. Rhett is stronger as his name implies. Sometimes it's all in a name.

    Forgive the typos - am at Little Roundtop in the pouring rain but I love it!!!

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    1. Scarlett would have eaten Ashely for breakfast. My view of Melanie is different. I think she was extremely strong. Of course, if they had had to depend on her to feed them, they would have starved to death.

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    2. Cheryl, I can't wait to see the pics of your trip. Hope you continue to love it!

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  10. Names are the most important part of characters. Even naming children. Stats out there claim a child grows into his/her name and becomes everything that name implies.

    We chose strong names for our kids and depending upon the nature of my characters, they choose their own names. Basically, they pick their names from the various books I have or online resources. Works every time!

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    1. You know I am am skeptical about that. But I support you in your belief.

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    2. My mother should have named me Scarlet. I am convinced that if she had, I would have been a much more assertive person. But alas, my mother was pretty smart, and she would not have gotten along nearly as well with a Scarlet!!!

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    3. Melanie, it is interesting that you think a different name would have shaped your personality differently.

      I often make the comment that my ex-husband wanted a Melanie, too bad for him I am more of a Scarlett. :-)

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    4. You go, Stephanie-Scarlet! I admire Scarlets, but alas, I can't seem to be one to save my life.

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  11. I'm late, but piping in anyway! What a fun conversation! I have been known to have a fondness for variations of Nicholas for a hero. I don't know why. I have had a Nico and a Niccolo (who turned into Nico on the page because it's the shortened form), both published. My first contemporary (unsold, with good reason) featured a Nick. And my first published serial short story also had a Nick.

    In my first published book, Alejandro just kind of came to me as a gorgeously masculine Spanish name. I looked up the rest until it fit: Alejandro Arroyo Rivera de Ramirez. Rebecca Layton told me her name.

    Like Linda, the names do have to come to me. My second book had Nico Cavelli from the beginning. The heroine started out life as Charlotte St. Clair. She was not a Charlotte! Or a St. Clair. When she told me her name, it was Lily Morgan. Quite a far cry from Charlotte!

    In the book I just finished, Roman Kazarov also told me his name, as did Caroline Sullivan-Wells -- and both from the beginning. I do have a fondness for the name David as a villain for some reason. Not that my books usually have villains, but my unpublished stuff does. And David swaggers across the page being bad.

    I do look in name books and on websites (especially when searching for a foreign name), but the name has to leap out at me as the correct one. I'm about to begin a new sheikh book and the name has yet to leap out at me. (In that case, the country name has to leap out at me too because I make it up.)

    I am very afraid of naming someone something that brings up a different association in the reader's mind, like Keith Hamilton and ice skating. Oh, funny enough, in the book I just finished, I have the hero, who is Roman, and his child with the heroine was named Christian. I was nearly through with the book when I realized that Roman and Christian was a groaner. Christian had to become Ryan. Thank heavens for find and replace!

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  12. You should have kept Christian and named a antagonist Lyon.

    I have never learned to use "working names". I just wanted to get it on the page. I didn't want to fool with names. I would change them later. But when I sat down to change them, Brantley, Lucy, and Missy took issue with me. I guess those were their names after all.

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