Difficult Decisions: What's in a Name?

I would not call myself an indecisive person. Sure, I'll take hours at the bookstore because I want to make sure I'm not wasting my money on a book I'm not going to like. Yeah, I take a while when buying makeup because I want to compare prices and the quality of what I'm getting. But when it comes to important decisions, I may take my time to make the choice, but once I do, I do not waver. I hold on to the idea and carry it forward to fruition, no matter the cost.

But that's in my every day life. In my life as a writer, I make difficult decisions every time I create a character. One of the hardest decisions to make when creating a character is a name.

So much can be said about a person by their name. My name is Alison, and to me that is a very proper, sophisticated name. Of course, my nickname is Ali, and to me that sounds a bit childish and fun. When I'm in a formal setting, I prefer Alison. When I'm chilling at home with friends or family, Ali is usually more comfortable.

When creating a name for my characters, I take into account their appearance, their personalities, and what I want to be percieved by their name. I'll use 2 of my favorite characters as examples.

Briste is a character I created in 2004 with the help of two of my best friends, Shelley and Grady. In this instance, the character was brought to life because of the name. When I was 15 I got really into the idea of learning Irish Gaelic. Well, let me tell yah, that's one of the most difficult languages to learn (in my opinon) because nothing looks the way it sounds. I realize that's how it is for a lot of languages, but my word! Anyway, I was on the Google translator and wanted to know what the word for "broken" was in Gaelic. The word "briste" popped up. I do not know how to pronounce this word to the day,  but I thought that it would be a beautiful name for a girl, and I would pronounce it Bris-tee.

So, with a name that essentially means "broken" what kind of person is Briste? At first, Briste was a half angel half vampire. I figured it'd be an interesting play on her name, but as I grew older and more mature in my characterization, I realized that was incredibly cheesy. So instead, I made her a half witch, half vampire with an incredibly complicated life. I won't give away too much about her character simply because I haven't written the books yet, but from this name spawned an entire person. I know what kind of jokes she likes, what food she eats, to what religion she follows. I know everything about Briste, and it all started from her name.

Another character of mine from the Briste series actually had no name for a very long time. He wasn't in my original idea, nor my second draft of the idea. He came about after I watched the movie From Hell with Johnny Depp and I thought, "Johnny Depp would be an amazing vampire." I still think this is true, though I no longer associate my character with Johnny Depp's looks. He has taken on a whole new persona in the few years since he's been created.

First came his looks. Like I said, I thought Johnny Depp would have been a wonderful vampire and pictured him with long hair, mustache and beard, and tall and lanky. I always pictured him surrounded by people in a dark red room. I don't know why. At first, he was a villian. He was the enemy of the witches, and at the time, the witches were my heroes. But then I started delving deeper into his character, and everything about him changed. Suddenly, he was a vampire that had been changed against his will during the time of the Spanish Inquisition. He made two friends that he trusted along the way, another Spaniard vampire named Gabriel (I loved the angel's name, even if I didn't want to use angels in my story anymore) and an Egyptian vampire named Hamon. Sometime in their far distant future, Gabriel would fall in love with a witch and they would create a child: Briste. This is when my unknown vampire was given a name: Dominic De La Cruz, his surname meaing "of the cross" and he's in a battle with himself about whether or not he will be accepted into heaven, even though he's a blood drinker. I know, that part is a little bit Twilight esque, but I promise, I didn't steal it from that. This character took on a personality of his own and basically told me his story, not the other way around.

I know naming a character doesn't quite seem like a difficult decision to most people, but most people aren't trying to create a whole person on paper. Once you've invested so much of yourself into creating someone, you won't take for granted the importance of a name.

Alison