Some names stick with us.
Bridget Jones, Holden Caulfield, Nero Wolfe — these names are all indelibly stamped into our literary consciousness.
Those names are evocative. Memorable. Unique.
Some writers are incredibly good at coming up with names.
I am not one of them.
Left to my own devices, I end up naming characters things like Adrienne Latwusdish or Coreen Meulerstein. Pulitzer prize winners, these are not.
So what do I do? What any sensible man does.
I ask my wife.
Turns out, she’s a genius with names. Effortlessly, she conjures up lists of names that sparkle, names that capture the essence of my characters and make them real.
Unlike me — I come up with bell-ringers like Barry Haseltine and Norbert Crawhorn.
Ehh … Not gonna happen.
My latest invention? A dame called Mississippi Jones.
Catchy, right? Not.
Try typing “Mississippi said” a few dozen times, and you’ll see where I went off the rails.
So, the moral is simple: know your weaknesses. And then find that special someone who can help make you look smarter than you really are.
Trust me, it’s worth it.