Siwel and Nohan and Dag: Bad Ways to Name Characters

We’ve all been there. You’re writing a novel, and you need a name for a character. Quickly! That’s how you can end up with Siwel and Kensin. Or with a dozen dudes named Dag.

Here are some bad, silly, goofy, and outright terrible character naming techniques that backfired on me.

Source: Photo by the author.

1) Don’t Turn a Familiar Name or Term Backwards

This is how you end up with a character named Siwel. But it was urgent! My hero needed an assistant. Right away! He was walking to his assistant’s desk, and I didn’t have time to look up names. But wait! There was a book on my desk by Lewis Carroll. So Siwel was born. (It could have been worse. I could have named him Llorrac.)

Then, someone read my draft and asked how Siwel was pronounced. And I had to admit, “I don’t know. It’s Lewis spelled backwards.” At least we got a good laugh out of it.

Source: Photo by the Author.

2) Don’t Give Your Character a Name That Looks Cool but Sounds Wrong

There’s that pronunciation thing again. I had a character named Nohan. It looks great on paper!