How to come up with names for characters
Plus an event at Eltham Bookshop
One of the most-asked questions I get is about character names. And it’s one of my favourites, because I love naming characters. I keep long lists of names that I’m drawn to, that feel, as CS Pacat would say, iddy to me.
I’m currently writing a book with dual protagonists (a first for me!), and two names came to me very quickly - Tansy and Alec. The book is high fantasy, and they felt familiar, but could fit into my world. However, I realised yesterday that I had to change Alec, because I another main character’s name starts with an A, and I hate it when characters names are too similar in books (looking at you, Sauron and Saruman).
So Alec had to change, but there was a bigger problem. Alec has been raised in a kind of military academy with his brothers and sisters, where individualism is discouraged. So I wanted some kind of naming tradition for them. I didn’t want to go as dehumanising as FN-2187, so I considered other options:
numbers in Latin (Primus, Secundo, Tertius)
named after carnivorous animals (Crow, Fox, Viper, Worm)
named after carnivorous plants (Nepenthe, Drosera, Dionaea, Sarracenia)
violent sounding names (Ash, Bone, Flint, Blade, Beast)
monster names? (Chimera, Griffin, Cetus, Eidolon?)
And then I started thinking about virtue names. This military academy is not known for its virtues, so there is an appealing kind of irony there. So I made a list of potential names. (Naming is all about lists.)
Bright
Deft
Alacrity
Vigil
Beacon
Caliber
Merit
Silence
Temperance
Hale
Hallow
Candor
Valor
I love Silence as a name, but it needs to work with “Sir” in front of it, and Sir Silence doesn’t flow. Sir Caliber has the right sound and a built-in nickname of Cal, but makes me think of guns. I love Sir Hallow for a name, but I’m publishing a book next year called Unhallowed Halls. I like Sir Vigil, but I think the winner is Sir Merit.
It’s entirely possible I’ll change it again, but for now, my protagonists are Tansy and Merit.
Eltham Bookshop event
Come and see me on May 30 which is this Thursday at Eltham Bookshop. I’ll be in conversation with the lovely Hayley Gabrielle, talking all things fantasy. It’s $35 and you get refreshments and a signed copy of one of my books (or a book voucher for something else). I’d love to see you there!
Read
I loved Julia Armfield’s Our Wives Under the Sea, about a deep sea explorer who returns from a voyage, and her wife is worried that she has come back… wrong. I also really liked The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden. I am not usually a War Book person, but this one really got me.
Watch
Remember how I watched all of ER a couple of years ago, because I just couldn’t stop? Well now I’m doing that with Greys Anatomy. Why do I like a medical procedural and not one based on cops or lawyers? I think because I think of doctors as being (mostly) unequivocally good, whereas I’m a bit less enthusiastic about the general concept of police and lawyers. There are less baddies, and the stories are more about relationships between characters, which is my jam. Obviously I am also up to date on Bridgerton (swoon).
Make
I’ve picked up a knitting project that I abandoned three years ago, and am hoping it’ll be done in a couple of weeks. Maybe next newsletter I’ll be able to post a picture! I like to knit - it’s a creative activity that doesn’t require a great deal of brain, and I can do it in front of the telly.
Lili Wilkinson is the award-winning author of nineteen books for young people, including After the Lights Go Out and A Hunger of Thorns. Lili has a PhD from the University of Melbourne, and is a passionate advocate for YA and the young people who read it, establishing the Inky Awards at the Centre for Youth Literature, State Library of Victoria. Her latest book is Deep is the Fen.