Monday, March 5, 2012

Diary of an Author - Day 34

Choosing a name.
I've been consulting with friends, trying to come up with a couple of names for characters in the second book. When writing, I don't think any name should be a trivial matter; names can reveal a lot about the person. Think about what feelings stir when the name "Melfoy" rolls off your tongue. (I bet your nose scrunches up when you say it.)

Of course there are other times when authors try to purposefully mislead the reader by assigning a benign or nice sounding name to a really lousy character. Can you really imagine Andy Olsen being an ax murderer? But then, deception can often be part of the reading experience.

Names have had meanings since the beginning of time. The literal meaning of Adam is Mankind. Another biblical example I like is when God actually called down from Heaven and changed Saul's name to Paul. (Tell me that doesn't make for great non-fiction!)

I don't want to risk spoiling the plot, but I can give you a hint to the kind of name I am looking for in this closing - au revoir.

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