Jill K Willis
I get this question all the time. Most often, it’s followed up with, “Hey, name a character after me!”
So, here’s the strategy I used for “The Demons Among Us.”
With my main characters, I sought names that describe their personality and goals. For instance, the antagonist recruits students to become Satan worshippers. He seeks out the weak and preys on their insecurities. His name is Hunter.
There are two protagonists in the story who have huge character arcs, growing in faith and self-confidence throughout the story. I named them for the types of characters to which they aspire. Joy has everything but joy in her life at the beginning of the novel. Her brother, Daniel, is one of the first students Hunter targets. His namesake is Daniel from the Bible, who is a self-confident young man, grounded in faith.
I borrowed Joy’s boyfriend’s first name, Wesley, from a founder of the United Methodist Church, John Wesley.
One of Hunter’s protégés, Grayson Logan, is named after two towns. I lived in Grayson for sixteen years. The next town over is Loganville.
Hunter’s colleague, the evil Athaliah, is named after a Biblical character. Check out her story in Second Chronicles, Chapter 22.
I named two characters in memory of friends gone too soon. The chorus director, Mrs. Adkisson, is the spitting image and has the frank, fiery temperament of my best friend from elementary school, who succumbed to cancer in 2014. The assistant principal, Mr. Paul, also an AP who made it his mission to show mercy on wayward students, passed from heart failure in 2017.
To honor Miriam, my editor, I asked her to name the rabbi. After discussing the character’s traits with me, she chose to honor her grandfather by using his name, Rabbi Epstein.
If you’ve ever written a story, what did you name your main character and why?
Carol Eaton
Julia N. White
Gretchen Carlson
Very interesting, Jill. I sometimes name my characters by the meaning of the name or to match personality. Sometimes I just google popular names from a certain time period and choose from those. And other times I use names I like. Such as Jordan in Hesitant Heroes. Like you I try to include friends and family names as small characters just for fun.
Interesting how we choose names for our characters. I have different ways of choosing. Sometimes the names come easily and other times, I truly have to think and think. 🙂
Jill I love this! Especially the names in memory of those you’ve lost. My main character for my first book was named after the character traits I wanted for her. Her last name was my husband’s grandmother’s maiden name, who was also deceased, in honor of my husband’s family. I think it’s so cool what author’s think about when choosing character names! Thanks for sharing!
Cool! I can struggle for days trying to name main characters and still not be satisfied that I’ve conveyed the personality well enough. Secondary characters often are tips of the hat for family and friends–but the names still have to fit the characters.