Thoughts on Writing 17
#AmWriting #IndieAuthor #WritingCommunity
"Effects" automatically added to a pic taken late 2016 or early 2017, before we had the house painted.
The last time I talked briefly about coming up with character names. So far I've looked at using recognizable, what we might think of as common (or relatively common) names. But if we write or include some degree of science fiction and/or fantasy in our work, we may find we need to invent names, both for characters or places.
Sometimes we can use alternate names, those that are real but not used in everyday life. In the Stone Island Sea Stories, in the other world, America becomes Vespica. Vespica being a rework of Vespucci, as in Amerigo Vespucci. Here he contributed his first name to the newly discovered continent. There, his last name entered into history.
I selected "Triton" as the equivalent of Britain and decided it would be Grand Triton, rather than Great Britain. Kent lent its name to the kingdom at the heart of the Unified Kingdom, becoming Kentland. There the people, and most in the Independent Lands of Vespica speak Kentish, rather than English, although one would not notice a difference, other than for regional dialects or accents. I go back into histoy a ways and thus Pictland equates to Scotland, and so on. France is Gallicia, Spain, Cordoba, and so on.
The primary Vespican Original People in the stories are the Kalish, with the same based on the Salish Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest. I simply chose a different first letter for the name. (And after the fact I realize there are people in the world with the last name, Kalish, but it is simply coincidence.) The name for the Kalish Dream Chief Shostolamie came about in an effort to match the overall sound of several place names within Washington, such as Snoqualamie, Snohomish, etc.
Sometimes we just have to make up names, and especially as we near the end of the third Stone Island Sea Story, there are a lot of completely invented names. I've found that crossword puzzles, word find puzzles, and even web addresses (URLs) can be of help in finding or coming up with names. That's because the spacing between words is different or non existant and we see things from a different view. As an example, in stoneislandseastories(dot)com, we find the words, ton, tone, land, lands, seas, east, astor, and tories. It might be possible to combine some of these to come up with a new place name or even the name of a character.
We can also spell things backwards to come up with a name, or we can rearrange letters or syllables to arrive at a unique name. One of the places mentioned in the latest story is called Masig, and it is simply a rearrangement of Sigma. Sometimes when I've come up with a name via these methods, I've further refined it by dividing it into separate words, altering a letter here and there, all to make it a little more pronouncable.
As a final note, I've found that when inventing names (or other words), it's a good idea to write them down so as to have a reference as to how they are spelled. It's very possible to forget and spell it differently everytime it's used. By the way, the same can be said of regular names we might use. It's possible to spell many names or similar sounding names in different ways. Is it Newberry, Neuberry, Newbury, or what? Is it Glenn or Glen? Clemens or Clemmons? I think you get the picture. (Some years ago I read a book by a fellow member of Spokane Authors and Self-Publishers. It threw me for a loop when a character named Eric was suddenly identified as Erik, or perhaps Erick. It took me a while to realize it was supposed to be the same individual.)
Hoping everyone has as good a Christmas/Holiday Season as possible, and that the New Year is better for us all!
Dave
"Effects" automatically added to a pic taken late 2016 or early 2017, before we had the house painted.
The last time I talked briefly about coming up with character names. So far I've looked at using recognizable, what we might think of as common (or relatively common) names. But if we write or include some degree of science fiction and/or fantasy in our work, we may find we need to invent names, both for characters or places.
Sometimes we can use alternate names, those that are real but not used in everyday life. In the Stone Island Sea Stories, in the other world, America becomes Vespica. Vespica being a rework of Vespucci, as in Amerigo Vespucci. Here he contributed his first name to the newly discovered continent. There, his last name entered into history.
I selected "Triton" as the equivalent of Britain and decided it would be Grand Triton, rather than Great Britain. Kent lent its name to the kingdom at the heart of the Unified Kingdom, becoming Kentland. There the people, and most in the Independent Lands of Vespica speak Kentish, rather than English, although one would not notice a difference, other than for regional dialects or accents. I go back into histoy a ways and thus Pictland equates to Scotland, and so on. France is Gallicia, Spain, Cordoba, and so on.
The primary Vespican Original People in the stories are the Kalish, with the same based on the Salish Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest. I simply chose a different first letter for the name. (And after the fact I realize there are people in the world with the last name, Kalish, but it is simply coincidence.) The name for the Kalish Dream Chief Shostolamie came about in an effort to match the overall sound of several place names within Washington, such as Snoqualamie, Snohomish, etc.
Sometimes we just have to make up names, and especially as we near the end of the third Stone Island Sea Story, there are a lot of completely invented names. I've found that crossword puzzles, word find puzzles, and even web addresses (URLs) can be of help in finding or coming up with names. That's because the spacing between words is different or non existant and we see things from a different view. As an example, in stoneislandseastories(dot)com, we find the words, ton, tone, land, lands, seas, east, astor, and tories. It might be possible to combine some of these to come up with a new place name or even the name of a character.
We can also spell things backwards to come up with a name, or we can rearrange letters or syllables to arrive at a unique name. One of the places mentioned in the latest story is called Masig, and it is simply a rearrangement of Sigma. Sometimes when I've come up with a name via these methods, I've further refined it by dividing it into separate words, altering a letter here and there, all to make it a little more pronouncable.
As a final note, I've found that when inventing names (or other words), it's a good idea to write them down so as to have a reference as to how they are spelled. It's very possible to forget and spell it differently everytime it's used. By the way, the same can be said of regular names we might use. It's possible to spell many names or similar sounding names in different ways. Is it Newberry, Neuberry, Newbury, or what? Is it Glenn or Glen? Clemens or Clemmons? I think you get the picture. (Some years ago I read a book by a fellow member of Spokane Authors and Self-Publishers. It threw me for a loop when a character named Eric was suddenly identified as Erik, or perhaps Erick. It took me a while to realize it was supposed to be the same individual.)
Hoping everyone has as good a Christmas/Holiday Season as possible, and that the New Year is better for us all!
Dave