Parents only have to come up with names a few times, and they often fail miserably. Writers have to do it a lot more; they subsequently have many more times to fail and they often do. Characters’ names are important; they can make a story seem more or less real.

I was lucky my parents didn’t name me Leonard. It invariably would be shortened to Lonnie or Lon, and I was bullied with “Lawn Mower” enough as a kid—why encourage it? I have a rather common last name as it is that maybe indicates I’m at least part Irish (the O’ being dropped somewhere along the line), but my Dad’s favorite boxer, Archie Moore, was a strong and handsome black champion long before Ali, who wasn’t Arab.

The above maybe belies my belief that characters’ names are important, and real names can even be hilarious. In one of CNN’s news segments on COVID-19 a few months ago (eons for this pandemic—I never watch Fox’s fake news, by the way), they interviewed a Dr. Bright, a nice enough and smart fellow. I have to confess the name was a distraction as I asked myself, did become a doctor because of his surname? Of course, he didn’t choose it, but that was my knee-jerk reaction. And it’s anecdotal proof that characters’ names can influence readers’ perceptions.

Authors, however, choose their characters’ names. It’s not an easy task, especially for US authors whose characters belong to our wonderfully diverse melting pot. A wrong choice can trouble readers; it could also bring down the wrath of the anti-cultural appropriation crowd upon the writer. I worry more about the first than the second, of course. But no one wants to use names tantamount to Dick, Jane, and Spot—i.e. stereotypes like Jones and Smith…or Moore!

Here’s what I do: I start a story and pick names for characters as I go. Often I get to the point where the name for a character just doesn’t seem and think of a better name. I do a find-and-change the first name to the second throughout the file…and presto. I’ve renamed that character. (Sorry, you have to do first names separately from surnames because often only one of them is used. And often, with nicknames, you even need another pass: You might want to change Vladimir to Volodya. I’m thinking of my arch-villain Vladimir Kalinin AKA Volodya plus many aliases. Names for villains are very critical.)

In a sense, authors have thousands of children, their characters. They must take as much care in naming them as the proud parents of a newborn. But they have to take into account a character’s era, culture, and circumstances. Naomi Wong might be used for a Chinese-American, for example, but it won’t work in Taiwan. Horace might work for a man from the 1800s (I apologize for the obscure literary pun), but the last Horace I knew was a hamster. And so forth.

Choose your characters’ names carefully. You readers will thank you.

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Comments are always welcome.

Rogue Planet. Considering how too many want to see the US become a fascist theocracy like Iran, only evangelical (the pope’s the anti-Christ, don’t you know), I thought some readers might be bold enough to see what a sci-fi world like that might look like. Along with Soldiers of God, some of you might have concluded even before now that I don’t like evil theocracies of any flavor. Well, you’re right. Here one man leads the charge against one to save his planet. Will he succeed? Or will he lose his head like the other so-called heretics? Set in the same sci-fi universe as the “Chaos Chronicles Trilogy,” this is hard sci-fi with a Game-of-Thrones flair (there are no dragons). Available wherever quality books are sold.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

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