Naming Antagonists

You know who antagonists are: they’re the bad guys (or NOT the good guys) in your novel. It’s thoroughly enjoyable creating them because you can play God with their antics, but giving them names is one of the things I find the most fun in writing fiction. Still, how do you choose a name that readers (especially family and friends) don’t immediately say, “Aha, I know who that’s supposed to be!”?

When I created the antagonist Nolan Barker, the evil land developer, for my newly released novel Wild Ones, it was actually pretty easy. I’d been getting tons of spam (especially offers of porn) in my email inbox. At that time the spam senders usually had a first and last name, making the spammer sound like a real person. One spam I received was from someone named Nolan Barker. I have no idea if that was the spammer’s real name or if he/she had hijacked the name from some poor unsuspecting person to use for their nefarious purposes, but I decided that using the name in a negative way would be payback for the spammer’s deeds.

One other character, Rex Salter, who appears later in the book, also received his name courtesy of a spammer. However, the rotten punk, Kevin Palola, was named (partially) after graffiti that was found scrawled in a house I moved into when I was about ten. Back then it was unusual to see names written on walls or spray painted in public. I never found out who this Palola kid was, but apparently he “was here” in multiple places all over the property. Given the time frame, circa early 60′s, I’m sure he’s long since dead now, but his name lives on.

I’d be interested in hearing how other writers name their characters (good and bad).