Guest Post- Names Are Important

Today we are happy to have guest poster James R. Callan, author of A Ton of Gold here to talk about the importance of naming characters. Welcome James!

Names Are Important   by James R. Callan

Is selecting a name for you characters important?  Have you ever just picked up the telephone directory, opened it at random and grabbed a name?

Suppose Margaret Mitchell had named her protagonist Jane.  Would she have started the reader with a different impression than she did when she selected Scarlett?  Before we even meet Scarlett we have a feeling about her.  Scarlett reminds us of heat, emotion, energy, fire.  We expect a fiery, energetic, volatile woman. 

Do we start out with a different impression if the man guy is named Winston or Joe?

J.K. Rowling is one of the most successful writers of our time.  Do you think she spent time on her characters’ names – and not just the major characters?  And did they start us out with an impression?  Draco Malfoy?  Nymphadora Tonks?  Ron Wesley? Servius Snape?  Those names did not just trip off her tongue; she worked to come up with them.   Why, with all those great names, did she name the protagonist a rather plain name – Harry Potter?  Perhaps she wanted to give us the impression that he was an ordinary person, a reluctant hero. 

The name is part of the character.  Why do people change their name in real life?  Because they want a different persona, a different outward expression that better reflects how they feel about themselves, how they want to be viewed.  So you, the writer who is creating this character, need to decide how the character views herself.

In Deadly Additive,  Donn Taylor named a secondary character who always operated on the edge, Brinkman.  An accident?  I don’t think so.  Ian Fleming gave us some insight into the character of his antagonist in The Richest Man in the World when he named him Auric Goldfinger. 

Can the name mislead us?  Certainly, if you want it to.  Just don’t let it happen by mistake.  Tiffany can be a person who spends her life helping the homeless, living and eating with them, and then returning to her one room under the Elevated. Maybe her parents are rich and she was to be a debutant.  But the girl wanted to do something more important. 

You can use the name to help make the case for who this person is, or who the parents imagined she might be.  Holly Golightly was a happy, carefree woman.  Sam Spade was a straight forward, no frills, hard working person who dug for clues. 

Suppose your heroine is named Catherine. If she calls herself Cat, that tells us how she sees herself, and how the reader should view her.

Select the names of your characters carefully.  Do not use the name as simply a way to distinguish one character from another.  Make a conscious effort to select a name that helps build your character.

You work hard to give your book a name that will entice the reader to pick it up and read.  Select your character name to make your book memorable.

A Ton of Gold

A contemporary mystery / suspense novel

Can long forgotten, old folk tales affect the lives of people today? In A Ton of Gold, one certainly affected young, brilliant Crystal Moore. She stands on the brink of losing everything – her only family, her self-esteem, her career and quite possibly her life.  Two people are killed, others threatened, a house burned and an office fire-bombed – all because of an old folk tale, greed and ignorance. 

On top of that, the man who nearly destroyed Crystal emotionally is coming back.  This time he can destroy her career.  She’ll need all the help she can get from a former bull rider, her streetwise housemate and her feisty 76 year-old grandmother.

About James Callen

After a successful career in mathematics and computer science, receiving grants from the National Science Foundation and NASA, and being listed in Who’s Who in Computer Science and Two Thousand Notable Americans, James R. Callan turned to his first love—writing.  He wrote a monthly column for a national magazine for two years, and published several non-fiction books.  He now concentrates on his favorite genre, mystery/suspense, with his fourth book, A Ton of Gold, released in February, 2013.

Website:  www.jamesrcallan.com

Blog site: www.jamesrcallan.com/blog

Facebook:  James Callan

Twitter:  @jamesrcallan

On Amazon, in paperback, at:  http://amzn.to/UQrqsZ 

Or the Kindle edition at:  http://amzn.to/12PeHJb       

Or from Oak Tree Press at:  http://bit.ly/WJXcWl  

Naming Characters After Real People

By Beth Groundwater

Many people ask me if any of my characters are based on real people in my life. The answer is always no, with one exception. Sometimes when I attend a mystery fan conference, I will put a character name in an upcoming novel up for bid in the silent or live auction they often have for a literacy-related charity.

Usually, the novel has already been written, though, so what people are bidding on is the privilege of their name being used for an existing character. Also usually, that existing character is not one of the main characters, and not a character that will continue on in future books in the series. So, I already know something about the character, but I don't know them to the depth that I know my main characters, such as my sleuths, Mandy Tanner and Claire Hanover.

That gives me the leeway to add or modify a secondary character's personality and background to match key aspects of the winner of the name of that character. And that's the fun and the challenge for me, to incorporate as much of the winner as I can in the fictional character--even if the character is evil, the villain, or the victim. Of course, mystery fans just LOOOOVE being the victim or villain!

I recently turned in the revised manuscript for the third book in my RM Outdoor Adventures mystery series, titled Fatal Descent. In the book, Mandy Tanner and her boyfriend Rob, who own an outfitting company together, take a group of clients on a whitewater rafting trip down Cataract Canyon on the Colorado River in Utah. At least one of those clients will not make it out alive, and Mandy, Rob and their two trusted guides, Gonzo and Kendra, must keep their clients safe while at the same time figure out whodunnit.

At this spring's Malice Domestic conference, two people "won" (bid the highest amount for) character names in the book. Their names will become public fodder when the book is published in May, 2013, so I might as well get them used to the notoriety now! One winner was a man, Tom O'Day, and the other was a woman, Maureen (Mo) Heedles. I collected email addresses from both and communicated after the conference with both about what character they'd like to "be."

In Mo's case, I have three married female friends who go on this fatal trip with Mandy and Rob to get away from their husbands and kids. One is an animal track spotter, one is a wildflower enthusiast, and one is a birder. Some of these areas of expertise turn out to be useful in the solving of the crime. I asked Mo if she'd like her name to be used for one of these three characters. She replied that she is an avid flower gardener, loves wildflowers, and takes photographs of flowers that she hangs in her kitchen gallery. So, I gave my wildflower enthusiast Mo's name, added a line of dialogue where she mentions her kitchen gallery of wildflower photos, and made sure she snaps some photos of flowers on the trip. I was able to use a few other characteristics that Mo gave me in an email about herself, but I'll leave those as a surprise for her to find when she reads the book. ;-)

In Tom's case, he is an avid bidder on character names in mystery novels and told me that he has enjoyed being characterized as a villain or evil-doer in past novels. He also told me that as a teenager, he wanted to be involved in the outdoor life as a park ranger. I couldn't name any of my four river guides (Mandy, Rob, Gonzo, Kendra) on the Fatal Descent trip into Cataract Canyon after him, because they are all recurring characters that have already appeared in other books of the series. However, one other guide comes along on the trip--a climbing guide, since the trip includes some rock climbing adventures. This guide, who goes by the nickname of Cool, is a womanizer who manages to piss off both Mandy and many of the female clients with his overtures. What a delicious ever-doer for Tom to become! ;-) Again, I was able to use some other characteristics that he gave me in an email about himself, but I won't ruin the fun he'll have in discovering them when he reads the book.

Making these changes to two of the characters in Fatal Descent meant more work for me, in addition to addressing the revision requests that my editor gave me, but they also made the revision process more fun. I hope Tom (Cool) and Mo are pleased with the result!

Have you ever had a character named after you in a mystery novel? If so, please tell all! What did you think of the experience?

Naming Characters

What would you name these two characters? Tom and Harry? No, that's too common, not colorful and memorable enough. How about Darren and Dave? No, those names are too similar and readers might get confused if they were both in the same story. How about Leonardo and Alfred? What does that say about their ethnic background, their personalities?

When an author is creating new characters for a novel or story, picking names for those characters can be a difficult and delicate task.

For one thing, you don't want your readers getting confused about who is who. I use a simple tool to make sure that not too many of my characters have first names that start with "T" or last names that start with "P." For each book I write, I create and maintain a three column chart. The first column contains the 26 letters of the alphabet, the second contains the first names of my characters next to the letter of alphabet they start with, and the third contains the last names of my characters in the same row as their initial letter. I put ALL of the character names in this chart, even the walk-ons. I try to make sure that no more than two first names and two last names are in each letter row, and if possible, that one is a minor character name and one is a major character name or one is female and one is male. Also, I try to make sure they don't start with the same two letters, like Darren and Dave above. Or the last names of Smith and Smothers.

For my significant characters that will have major roles in the story, I work to pick names that match their ethnicity and location, age (Miriam for an older woman and Brittany for a younger one, for example), and personality. For ethnicity and location, I often use a phone book. My Claire Hanover gift basket designer mysteries have been set in Colorado Springs and Breckenridge, Colorado, and I have used phone books from those cities to pick names for my characters who live in them. I won't take a full name verbatim from the phone book, but will mix first and last names from different listings until I get a name that "feels right" for that character. For my Rocky Mountain Outdoor Adventures series, which is set in Salida, Colorado, I use a Salida phone book.

For personality matching, I will often look up the meaning of first names, especially, on the various baby naming websites to see if the name fits that character's personality. And people do attach emotional meanings to names. I remember playing the Barbie Queen of the Prom game when I was a girl. Everyone wanted to win a date with dreamy Ken and no one wanted one with creepy Poindexter! So a strong action-oriented male figure may have a short, clipped first name like Dirk, Brad, or Curt, while your computer nerd might be Peter, Ronald, or Chester.

Then there's the added complexity when someone wins a character name in one of my books from a mystery conference charity auction. I may find that after I assign their name to a minor character in one of my books that their first name or last name is too close to another character's name. So, I have to change that other character's name, too. Or, maybe the physical look or personality I've given that minor character doesn't match the auction winner's name. So, I'll change the character's hair color, or add glasses, or even change the ethnicity.

Names are important!

If you're a reader, please tell me your favorite fictional character names and why you like them. And if you're a writer, I'd love to know how you go about picking your character names!