Whenever I think of or come across a good name I just write it down in a .txt. When the time comes for me to name a character or location I just look through my list of unused names and pick one that will fit well.

Don't name your characters Mike and Mary if they live in SPACE.

Don't name your characters Mike and Mary if they're ELVES.

Don't name your characters Mike and Mary if they live in JAPAN.

Don't name your characters Mike or Mary if they live in MIDDLE AMERICA.

Make your character names fit the setting, but if your setting is normal to your readers, give them normal names, but not common names. John Smith is not a good name for your character's next door neighbor. Max Quinn is a better name because its less common.

Babynames.com is your friend.

think of a made up name...there you go

start with a name you know and put a different sound on it, combine names, combine sounds
Bastos
Hitchen
Crostone
Joliene
Kristican
Licksneck
Obtuth
Vindendron
Zystidra
also >>6708

>>6713

Tee hee. Obtuth sounds like someone said obtuse with a lisp.

Here's a good name, free of charge: Sgt. Lucius Strafe. Sgt. Strafe will fuck you up. He runs across Siberia on foot, killing wolves with his bare hands and taking out commies!!

>>6714

Sounds like a pale immitation of Lt. L .T. Smash

Mira and Anya Goodard, beartrapping sisters that don't afraid of anything.

OP here.
Thanks guys, I'll put your advice to good use.

>>6708

Mike Donovan would like to have a word with you.

>>6703

Don't forget to google then name you come up with, or search for it on wikipedia. Accidentally naming your character after someone famous or otherwise well known is a pain in the ass.

Mack Slaybaugh

C. H. Tedeschi

>Don't forget to google then name you come up with, or search for it on wikipedia. Accidentally naming your character after someone famous or otherwise well known is a pain in the ass.

This. Although it is very hard to come up with location names that are entirely unrelated to anything in the real world while also sounding somewhat familiar. A city I named for example shares its name with a fungal disease.

Good point on googling the names.
>>6740
I did the same but used the name of the cause of one of the most notorious diseases.

Also, I have a question. How often do you guys space chapters?
Ive heard its usually done around 2-4k words?

>>6708

I use common character names for stock characters or just common characters. I usually like the characters name to say something about the character.

>>6743

I've always wondered how far apart chapters should be spaced. I usually write short chapters (about 5-7 pages on MS word). I hate when I'm reading a book and the chapters are 30+ pages apart because I like to stop reading at the end of a chapter and I don't want to have to slog through a ton of pages just to get to a point where I feel comfortable putting the book down.

Nobody wants to mess with a dude named Comet Dicksmasher.

Usually I make an outline of a character and come up with a portmanteau for their name that is derived from what kind of character they are. Sometimes I just have a general character idea in my head and come up with the name right then and there. For example:

Lady Jen Errol became commander of her husband's forces after he died in battle.

Tobe Ginwith is Jen Errol's adjutant.

Admir Ruhl is the sheik of a small island known for it's exemplary navy.

Rick O'Shea makes and designs guns.

Mackenzie Guffin came up with the revolutionary power system that powers Rick's latest and most ambitious weapons platform.

Halle Burton is an ex-mercenary who manufactures exploding bullets.

Michael Jeremy Ironside-Burns... well, I was just having fun with that one.

Ray Venn has an empathetic link with black-colored animals.

Glenn Dell projects a field which slows down bullets and other fast-moving objects, protecting him from anything save melee weapons.

Will Summer is an imposing rooster knight; i.e. a huge (fighting) cock.

Port Manteau: a seaside city whose main export is words.

>>7371

If I was reading something with names like that and it wasn't a Xanth novel, I'd stop reading it. They sound like bad jokes.

In general, outside of speculative fiction, I don't like it when characters have names that are relevant to who or what they are, because who or what they are is typically decided long after their name is. In some settings, like in a small village and/or long in the past it might make sense, as last names often come from occupations, and occupations are often passed down along with the last name. If it's a world where there's magic or prophesy or something at work it could be acceptable for a character to be named after what he's prophesied to do. It might also be a setting where people gain an appropriate name as an adult.

How you come up with names is entirely dependent on when and where your story is set. In real world settings, your character's last name is tied to his ethnicity. Where is he from? Where is his family from? This is potentially important shit for character development anyway. Think about your character's family. Are they American? When did they immigrate? Did they Americanize their name to fit in, or did they keep the old spelling and pronunciation? Are they hippies? Maybe they named their daughter Moon Unit. Many people name their kids after someone in their family, or their family's friends.

Once I've decided on a character's ethnicity and what his or her family is like, I typically just chose something random within that ethnicity that sounds nice from behindthename.com

I strongly prefer to avoid giving characters "douchebag moviestar names". Jake Bullet, Zak Fyr, Celestine Ephemera, Takeshi Kovacs (ahem) etc. I think that none of my characters have a name which a young teenager would choose for their alter-ego - it's annoying and doesn't help suspension of disbelief. Also I feel that such assfuck names are an astonishingly heavy-handed tool and interfere with legitimate character development. You're declaring something about the character in the name you give them, so try to give them one which (as people in this thread have said) is fitting to their background but also (just my opinion) try not to make it ostentatious, give them room to build their own character.

>>7371

¦¬)

Mike Hock - underused in the overall narrative, it's a small part but nevertheless it is implied that he is the protagonist's right-hand-man, only ever seems to commit shockingly irresponsible acts .

Melly Flewuss - Ridiculously ornate woman who won't fucking shut up.

The Villa Inn - local pub at which the baddies meet on a regular basis.

"Dear Sex Machine," uh - An advice column in the local newspaper, in which the characters of the story routinely find critical information despite there being absolutely no good reason nor explanation for its presence in said column.

Ma Fear - Middle-aged woman of some local repute. Very influential. Not one to mess with. Has quite a big family.

Since I mostly just write for my own amusement, I end up giving my characters the same name all the time. Simon's the first male to appear, Rachel the first female, then other male/female names from this pool: Benjamin, Sadie, Nicholas and Samantha. I almost never have more characters than this, but if I do they play such a bit role that I make up a nonsensical name to illustrate their unimportance.

I don't know if I'd recommend this technique, it's just how I do it.

It depends on the setting and the story. I was writing a comedy play set in the late 40s-50s with Russian leads. For some of them I took some simple Russian names and merged them together. Mikhail Antonov for instance, was thought of on the spot. I knew Antonov from the planes, but I didn't really think much of it. For the female lead however I put a lot more effort into. I wanted her to be a strong lead after having served in world war 2, so I looked up names of female Soviet soldiers. Her end became a merge of Lydia Litvyak's and Valentina Grizodubova, producing "Valentina Litvakov".

Merging names or cutting them up worked for an ethnic feel for me. Strangely enough the name Litvakov actually is an authentic name. Take what you will from that.

>>7403
That'd be "Litvakova" btw, since it's a female's name.