Naming is Easy. Just Start Eating

Naming Characters

I like to pair words together. I look at last names of people I know and have noticed a lot of them have two parts or two syllables. For example, Johnson, Donner. I started looking at things for the first part of a name or syllable and then different things for the second part. I ended up drawing a line down the middle of a sheet of paper. On one side of the line I wrote the first thing that came into my head.

“Meat” (I was eating dinner.) So I wrote down more things that had to do with food. I wrote:

• Meat
• Broccoli
• Pears
• Fat
• Bones
• Gristle
• Salt

Then on the other side of the line I wrote a starter word that was from a different category. I wrote about things you eat with. I came up with:

• Fork
• Fingers
• Chopsticks
• Teeth
• Lips

Then I started matching words from one side of the line to the other side of the line. I came up with things like:

• Bonetooth
• Forkfat

I combined words from the same side of the line:

• Forklips
• Chopteeth.

Finally I made a pair I liked; Gristleteeth That didn’t look as good or sound as good as I wanted it and I started thinking of variations and came up with Gristletooth. I liked it. Then I thought about the sound and decided it sounded like a male name and sounded like someone who was bad versus good. So no I had a nice character who would be an evil wizard. His name is Gristletooth. I also like names that mean something. A name like Johnson, probably came from a boy named after his father. He was John’s son. So they called him George Johnson.

Hillary and Windslow in my book have names with meaning. They are the children of the summer wind. I looked in the dictionary and thesaurus to find words that had something to do with wind. There is a gentle breeze that blows across the meadows and hills. I liked the idea and picked the words airy and hill. I put them together and modified them to fit more like a real name and came up with Hill-ary or Hillary! Cool.

There was another wind I read about that was more stormy and blew low through the valleys. I thought about that. It was a wind that was low. A low wind, or wind-low. I modified it to be Windslow (wind is low).

So now I had Hillary and Windslow, children of the summer wind. Now I needed a last name, which is what you asked about. I wanted to keep with the “Wind” idea. I looked back at what I had read about winds and decided I liked the idea of mixed summer winds in a meadow or field. I found what I wanted. Their last name was Summerfield.

Hillary and Windslow Summerfield, children of the wind.

How’s that? Just be creative and remember sometimes we just use Sally Jones or Bill Johnson for names because it’s easy to do and we’re done. As a good and interesting writer, sometimes taking the time to do a little research and a lot of daydreaming and using a lot of paper to scribble ideas on will produce something that will amaze you. Be happy and proud when that happens. It isn’t always easy or quick, but it is worth it.

Sometimes I just sit and try silly, goofy combinations. Some names in my books:

• Bitterbun
• Gandersnap
• Fistlock
• Lake Shimmer Gawn
• Gippleberry plants
• Flute beans

I almost have as much fun thinking up names as dreaming up an adventure.