I am a creative person, you know I paint, draw write and express myself through my style and lifestyle. This isn’t always easy, especially as a teenager who lives in a small judgemental town, where nobody important goes, and nothing exciting ever happens.
my life isn’t always easy, per se. And yet there are some unique struggles which very few are able to relate to. One of these struggles that I am all too familiar with is the struggle of naming your original characters, especially in stories.
I get inspired every once in a while and I just have to write a story, be it half a page or fifty pages, and the majority of them get thrown out, but, if I don’t write stuff down or get my creativity out some other way then I start to feel upset until I let out my creativity. One of my biggest challenges isn’t the plot, that flows easily, writing long stories, child’s play, what is this challenge I come across every. single. time
NAMES!!
The act of naming my characters is like trying to milk a cat. Painful, long and gives very sour milk. I have, however, come up with some cheats and solutions to my problem. Solution one – https://www.babble.com/baby-names/ just google something to do with the type of name you need, you know unique baby names, and then read until you find it. Solution two – name them after your friends, pro tip remember to ask your friends if they are ok/comfortable to be in your story and explain if the character is or isn’t based off them and if they say no ask someone else if they say yes thank them and pick up your pen.
I usually do a mix of both and my friends usually find it really funny when I encapsulate them in writing, even more so when I get their character into sticky situations they know they would get into. So keep writing even when you can’t find a good character name.
Side note – Jk Rowling ( the great) collects interesting names anywhere she can find them, graveyards, newspapers and writes them in a small notebook. maybe try that? Is rather morbid though.
