Young Writers Society

Well, I have an evil dark lord that's really remained nameless since I made him up, like, five years ago.
I've tried several names- Nythan, Ruther, and normal names- but nothing fits.
When I say he's an evil dark lord, I mean he's the bad guy, in charge of all the other bad guys. He's not a big background entity, though. He's a go-getter; he will get out there and do it all himself if he has to. Don't just expect his minions to come after you- often enough, he'll do it himself. He's very military centered, and very proud. I often call him simply the Black Captain.
The thing is... only one person in my story actually knows his name, so I've been thinking maybe the reason I can't think of his name is because, to most people, he doesn't have one. And since that one person doesn't like to talk about him, no one's likely to know it.
Any ideas, either on names or this nameless idea?

I kind of like the nameless idea, but eventually you're probably going to have to come up with a name. At first a bit of a mystery is a really good thing, plus it gives you some time to actually come up with a name. I know what you mean about names not sounding right, I actually almost never name anybody, although I do only write short stories. I just find that without a name the character could be anybody, you know what I mean? Plus names always sound so laaaaaameee!

Here's something I use for my character names... It's a bit lame, but it generates ideas!
http://www.rinkworks.com/namegen/
http://www.fantasynamegen.com/
Used these for my novel, actually.

I usually go onto an online dictionary of a language that is major in the story I'm writing, or fits the setting, or just the personality of the story and look at the meanings. I pick one trait from a character and search it. Sometimes a name doesn't come up, but then I search the next biggest trait, and so on, until a list of names come up. If I like more than one name, I'll write a few sentences or paragraphs in the story referring to the character as that name. If it sounds like it fits or flows well, then I keep it. If I like only two names, sometimes I combine the two spelling-wise, and it works for me, because both of the names have the same meaning in the same language.

I also go to random name generators if I can't find a last name for a character or a first name and I've already picked a good last name for them. It helps a LOT. I usually go for really unique names for my characters, or some names that haven't been used a lot, or spelling variations of some semi-common names. Other times, I'll usually ask some of my other aspiring writer friends to help me out. Brainstorming with someone who doesn't know your story as well as you do for names helps new ideas pop up and form.

I like Behind The Name because it's got a few different ways of searching for names. You can search for things you want in the meanings and there's quite a few other features that make it a good stop.

Also, slightly more specifically, there is this name generator which I used to pick my character's name in CelticaNoir's Potterbook storybook. I couldn't help myself. It generates such lovely sounding names which just seem nice to say! It must be something to do with the vowels.

...am I going to be summarily shunned if I say that I've never had a problem coming up with names for characters? Since I write high fantasy, I just make them up, and nowadays I used linguistics knowledge to make sure they all make sense together.

When I need "real" names, I usually just pull those out of a mental hat. They come to me without too much effort.

Sometimes, though, if I'm working with characters from foreign countries, I go and do research on a site like Behind the Name or countless baby-name sites to make sure that I'm being accurate. For Shiny, I have lots of foreign characters, and as a result, I'm spending lots of time researching to make sure I have authentic French, German, Polish, Ukrainian, etc. names.

If they're not a person that looks or sounds like they *are* a certain name, then I make a list of all possible names that would fit with the other characters names. And if I can't choose which one because they all fit, I ask someone else :3

And then there's me who names my characters based on what I'd like to call my kids.

Weirdly though, when I look up the name meanings of these names, they actually match the characters' personalities quite often. Maybe I'm psychic. FEAR ME.

I'm going to tell you how I come up with my names, if it will be usefull to you. When I'm writing fantasy and don't want a common name, I put a letter, lets say V (I'm going to use one of my names I made up with this method). Then I put random letters behind it untill it makes sense to me. So, my character's name is Valkaryot (Val-Carry-Ot). Simple to me, so just play around it.

Hrm...I've got a guy w/ 4+ names! Is that bad? I'm wondering...
Here's the deal: he lost his memory, so obviously he doesn't remeber his real name. (No one's around to tell him either)
His first name was Riem. (tell me, how do you pronounce that? I know how I want it to sound, but not sure if it comes across...) He was also known at that time by the alias "Ace"
After the memory thing, he called himself "Shaft," and after that, became known as a legendary fighter and reffered to by many a.k.a.s. Such as "Black Ace," "Ace of Spades," etc.
Too confusing? Tell me what ya'll think, thanks.

Hi everyone!

Can someone help me come up with a good name for...hmm... a name of a religion? The religion itself is like Christianity, which stems from Judaism.
At least Christianity came from the word Christ, which means 'the annointed' or 'the chosen one', if I still remember it correctly.
And Judaism, if I'm not wrong, originated from the belief that came from a kingdom a long time ago, before Israel was around. It's called the Kingdom of Judah, hence it became Judaism.

So...my intention is to make the reader know straight away this 'christian equivalent' religion really is the fantasy counterpart of christianity. The Judaism equivalent one can be not too similar in sound to the name 'Judaism', since if I start explaining the history I can just connect it that 'this' Judaism is the root of 'this' Christianity.

Sorry if my explanation just made everything so much harder to understand, but... yeah...

Thanks for reading =D

HaydenSmith wrote:Sometimes it takes awhile to name a character too.

I'm working on a novella and the main character's name is Wendy Grimm. The antagonist's name is Ethelred Antonescu.

It took me three years to name Wendy after going through these names:
Sarah, Beth, Sarabeth, Mary, Chastity, Chase, Kennedy, Lacey, and then finally Wendy Grimm, which works for the character.

My antagonist was a lot more frustrating to name. It took me four years. His character is basically the Devil incarnate, but I didn't want to be cheesy and name him something like Lucifer, Damon, or Lucian.

I went through the names: Nero, Salem, Leander, Silas, Dante, Claude, Vincent, Victor and many more. I then came across Ethelred, which I really liked.

Sometimes it takes awhile to name characters, but if you truly love the story, you can't be stopped from finding the perfect name.

I remember Wendy taking FOREVER to name!

Crouching Tuna wrote:Hi everyone!

Can someone help me come up with a good name for...hmm... a name of a religion? The religion itself is like Christianity, which stems from Judaism.
At least Christianity came from the word Christ, which means 'the annointed' or 'the chosen one', if I still remember it correctly.
And Judaism, if I'm not wrong, originated from the belief that came from a kingdom a long time ago, before Israel was around. It's called the Kingdom of Judah, hence it became Judaism.

So...my intention is to make the reader know straight away this 'christian equivalent' religion really is the fantasy counterpart of christianity. The Judaism equivalent one can be not too similar in sound to the name 'Judaism', since if I start explaining the history I can just connect it that 'this' Judaism is the root of 'this' Christianity.

Sorry if my explanation just made everything so much harder to understand, but... yeah...

Thanks for reading =D

Okay...if I'm understanding this right...What is the name of 'your' Christianity? What is the setting like? The mood and tone of the piece? That might help.

I use behindthename.com for a lot of cool names

EmilytheNovelist wrote:

Crouching Tuna wrote:Hi everyone!

Can someone help me come up with a good name for...hmm... a name of a religion? The religion itself is like Christianity, which stems from Judaism.
At least Christianity came from the word Christ, which means 'the annointed' or 'the chosen one', if I still remember it correctly.
And Judaism, if I'm not wrong, originated from the belief that came from a kingdom a long time ago, before Israel was around. It's called the Kingdom of Judah, hence it became Judaism.

So...my intention is to make the reader know straight away this 'christian equivalent' religion really is the fantasy counterpart of christianity. The Judaism equivalent one can be not too similar in sound to the name 'Judaism', since if I start explaining the history I can just connect it that 'this' Judaism is the root of 'this' Christianity.

Sorry if my explanation just made everything so much harder to understand, but... yeah...

Thanks for reading =D

Okay...if I'm understanding this right...What is the name of 'your' Christianity? What is the setting like? The mood and tone of the piece? That might help.

That's what I don't have yet. The name for 'my' Christianity.
The mood? Hmm, should be similar to between Jesus's anointment to Muhammad's being recognized as the Prophet for Muslim belief (which means anywhere between year 0 to 6-7th century, IIRC.)
With a little Steampunk + magic environment. The situation involves disputes between angels about the creation of a new religion/belief in the process.