Names, Names and More Names!

During my reading about how other writers work, I have noticed how important character names are.  It has been fascinating how different writers are when it comes to making up character names.

A number of questions have come up for me since I started this 2nd edit.  For instance, I realized if I elaborated and sprinkled the dialogues with slang indicative of the Protagonist's heritage, then her name does not fit.  

I always knew when I did my first draft that many of my character's names would be changed as I developed a better understanding of their actions and place in the plot line.  I also knew, I wanted to use names of people I could associate with the character to help me develop him or her as I went along writing my first draft.

The other thing I do, is I read out loud to myself.  If the name sounds awkward, I don't want it.  I want it easy to pass my lips!

Now that my firsts draft is down and I have a clearer understanding of my characters, I have new things I wanted to consider.

I know this novel of mine is on the verge of being a "cozy" murder mystery.  I always knew this work was meant to entertain and that I had no intention of make a great work of literary fiction.  So that changes the seriousness, in my mind, of the character's names and roles.  

To find appropriate names, I also wanted them to be indicative of the places the characters were from.  I realize now there are names sprinkled all over this huge country however I wanted names that not only I knew in my youth, but I knew were founding names for each province.  Looking through a yellow pages was just not going to cut it.

In the end, not only did I scour local newspapers, however I also looked in archives.  For instance one of my characters who has a fairly large role, comes from Newfoundland.  So I went searching historical archives for names of folks who were on that rock from very early times.  

Once I had a good size list for each area of the province of names I liked, I then had to remove any names which have a strong, but incorrect association.  For instance I could not keep the name of my favourite first grade teacher as my villain.  It just did not feel right and was confusing for me.

On the other hand, I didn't want to use names that were the same last name of someone in real life who was caught and convicted and had a reputation for a similar crime as my villain in the novel.  I didn't write this novel for personal vendettas or to poke bears!

The next thing I had to think about was just how generic or specific to the area the name was.  I decided my character needed to feel authentic.  I couldn't guarantee there wasn't anyone, at any time who didn't have the same name however I was double sure it was no one famous.  That would be awkward and I don't trust folks and their need for quick financial fixes by suing.

So, once I narrowed down my list, I went through and decided on the names I felt worked best.  I tried to think about how "loaded" the name was due to historical connections exposed to a wide audience because of the media, entertainment (including literary) and /or  biblical influences.  

Finally I had names I could live with.  Names that were easy for me to relate to and that I could attach fitting character arcs to.

Now came the problem of going through an entire novel and changing names.  Fortunately for me, I have friends with the experience and smarts to help me out. The need to go through the entire novel and change names could be an insane pain!  

So, since I did my writing in Word, I just used "Find and replace" in the Edit drop down.  I don't find it works perfectly and you still have to double check however it does the trick basically.

Macros are available also for word.  A macro allows you to go through huge documents and insert new things such as tables or letter heads, remove words or replace words.  You have to write a command in, which is then followed.  I think it would be far better and more accurate however I don't want to deal with learning about them right now.  I have enough to think about learning!  As long as the job gets done, to me that is all that matters.

Making up character names like, the name of your novel can be fun I have found, however I also know it is important!

Good luck with your own story!