Terry Shames's Blog: 7 Criminal Minds, page 192

The Name Game

How do you come up with titles and character names? Do they change during the writing process?

by Paul D. Marks

For names I simply call up Ye Olde Name Generator (see pic). A complicated machine of many parts. I feed in the alphabet and it spits out glorious and diverse names, usually something like “Joe”.
Or I might play the name game, you know, “Shirley! Shirley, Shirley, Bo-ber-ley, bo-na-na fanna, Fo-fer-ley. fee fi mo-mer-ley, Shirley!” – Is anyone even named Shirley anymore? If I was setti...

Just Add Elvis.

"How do you come up with titles? Do they change during the writing process?'

By Catriona.

Like Cathy yesterday, I'm sticking to titles because the process of naming characters is so different from the process of naming books. A character name comes while I'm writing, like the fourth name of the cat, from profound meditation and rapt contemplation. (see T.S.  Eliot's "The naming of cats" here).

The name of a book, in contrast, comes once the book's written. And it comes in various ways....

CASES about CORPSES and a CALENDAR! by Cathy Ace

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The Unnamed Post

How do you come up with titles and character names? Do they change during the writing process?
.... I'm having a hell of a time thinking of a title for this post.

TITLES:  Like Susan, I have a hard time with titles. A title should be original, a self-contained hook, maybe slightly ironic, possibly a play on words, should have a drumbeat to it, and hint at the essence of the novel. Easy!! 

No, it's not. Before publication it was fun thinking up titles. Just string together some groovy w...

The Reek of Wrong Titles and Character Names

Q: How do you come up with titles and character names? Do they change during the writing process?
- from Susan
CAPTAIN AHAB’S GREAT ADVENTURE
THE WHALE AND THE SEA CAPTAIN
ISHMAEL’S STORY
ONCE UPON A WHITE WHALE


A: Titles are tough for me. When forced to submit one I think is lame and that surely my publisher can improve, I’m rattled when they say, “Oh, I like that.” I admire authors who come up with good ones, time and time again. But nobody does it for me, alas, so I struggle. If anyone out there...

THE ROYAL LIBRARY, or BOOKS OF THE THRONE

"I gotta hit that IKEA in Westeros."
In my castle, the toilet tank is the space reserved for literary prominence and has been so going back to when I was a little prince of the South Side realm. If I wasn't in the bathroom with a book, I was in the stacks of Carter G. Woodson Public Library looking for one to bring back to the bathroom. I gave myself a Chicago Public School's equivalent of a twelve-year education ignoring the screams and pleas of my brothers to give up my seat in study hall if...

On the Road Again

What I’m Reading.
From Jim


I just returned from a week in Texas, where I spent time with great friends (and Mark Pryor, too), met a couple of new booksellers, and signed some books. And I drove. I drove a lot. Texas is as big as...well, as big as Texas. Knowing I was going to be on the road for several days, I decided to download some audiobooks to fill the time. And my week turned out to be very productive reading-wise. I managed to listen to five books in five days.


First up was William Kent K...

On the Road Again

What I’m Reading.
From Jim


I just returned from a week in Texas, where I spent time with great friends (and Mark Pryor, too), met a couple of new booksellers, and signed some books. And I drove. I drove a lot. Texas is as big as...well, as big as Texas. Knowing I was going to be on the road for several days, I decided to download some audiobooks to fill the time. And my week turned out to be very productive reading-wise. I managed to listen to five books in five days.


First up was William Kent K...

On the Road Again

What I’m Reading.
From Jim


I just returned from a week in Texas, where I spent time with great friends (and Mark Pryor, too), met a couple of new booksellers, and signed some books. And I drove. I drove a lot. Texas is as big as...well, as big as Texas. Knowing I was going to be on the road for several days, I decided to download some audiobooks to fill the time. And my week turned out to be very productive reading-wise. I managed to listen to five books in five days.


First up was William Kent K...

On the Road Again

What I’m Reading.
From Jim


I just returned from a week in Texas, where I spent time with great friends (and Mark Pryor, too), met a couple of new booksellers, and signed some books. And I drove. I drove a lot. Texas is as big as...well, as big as Texas. Knowing I was going to be on the road for several days, I decided to download some audiobooks to fill the time. And my week turned out to be very productive reading-wise. I managed to listen to five books in five days.


First up was William Kent K...