This week didn’t see a lot of writing. I’m not confident this week coming up will either. I’ll explain why next week. Otherwise, life is good. Today’s topic is about how important naming things is. This includes characters, countries, languages, and even magic. That’s why, as far as I’m concerned, a name is always more than a name.
Drawing from the Well
I started getting into my overall notes this week. So far, I’ve made it through *checks notes* two. These notes are definitely going to necessitate some changes across the novel. I look forward to getting into it deeper and through it and making it up to Draft 2.5. No word count updates this week, though.
Filling the Well
On the reading end, however, I did make some progress. I made it through Gatsby, which was fine but it was exactly what I expected: a character story of its time. You Don’t Belong Where You Don’t Belong, however, was a short story about vicious revenge and I loved it. Now I’m listening to The Stars My Destination which is another old novel, so those elements of C.S. Lewis and F. Scott Fitzgerald are there, but it has a story so I’m mostly enjoying it so far.
26/105 for #ProjectBookworm2024
Well Chat
Some of my best ideas come from my kids. On May 25, 2019, I wrote about just such a one in my Character Layering blog. Sometimes a name is just a name, but what if you can make it more than that?
Time to jump under the hood. It isn’t often that I reveal something like this, so enjoy it. There is a character in Book III named Chestnut. Her name tells you very little about who she is and placement/importance to the story. Chestnut is a nut, obviously. Nut is a synonym for crazy. Chestnut makes some unexpected decisions in Book III that underlines this. She also has hair the same color as her name: chestnut brown. On top of that, Chestnut is a long name, so I thought it would be fun to give her a nickname. Chess came to mind as it chops off the second syllable. But Chess is more than just the phonetic first syllable of her name; it is also a board game. That verbally positions Chess to be a strategist which can be useful. All of this is layering on top of the existing character archetype, history, experiences, and preferences to create a deeper character. And it’s all because I picked a particular name.
City names in my book are a little more complicated. I developed four languages for Genesis (yes, I did!). I didn’t go to Tolkien levels of depth in them, but I did develop them. Therefore, when I choose a name for a city, it is typically a two-step process of picking the name and then translating it into an appropriate language. So, for example, the country where Grant lives at the beginning of Blood in the Storm is called Mernfemm (I don’t think this is in the book, but it spoils nothing). This translates to Wall of Man. That name stems from one of the first wars on the planet between Normans (non-wizards) and the children of the Heralds. The “men” built a wall to protect against the powerful wizards and, since they survived, used that as the basis of their society going forward.
Little things like that initiate ripples throughout your story. Names are as important to me now as they have ever been. You should see what I what I went through to establish the new societies and characters for Book III. It’s PAGES of ideas just so that when I needed a character, all I had to do was go back to my notes. Have a great week.
May the tide carry you to safer shores.
BSG