Nathan Bransford - The Forums

... because we all know there are some truly horrendous ones out there.

Gotta love YA dystopian for this - it's full of them. So, sorry to the many who I'm sure this will offend, but I'm with Stephen King on this one (http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20223443,00.html): Katniss Everdeen has to be one of the stupidest names I've ever heard.

Bella Swan from Twilight. Hate to sound like the anti-fans, but it seems like they're kind of hitting you over the head with the whole "beautiful swan" metaphor.

Anything involving apostrophes or named after the author.

1. Character names with same first and last name initials (Kate Kennedy, Jack Johnson, etc, etc...)
2. Same as above, but the same initials are also used as nicknames, such as KayKay, JayJay, etc, etc...
3. Character names with one or more apostrophes.
4. When the author is giving a foreign first and surname to a character from a quite different nationality, yet trying to tell me this name should exist in that nation or country as a traditional name (Lack of research).
5. Character names, which is trying to tell us the character's style and / or origin... (Usually appearing in fantasies; Blackhand, Stonefist, Stormwind, etc, etc...)
6. Character names with lots of TH, RG, W, X, Y, Z.
7. Stupid short names, usually for twins or fictive pet companion, Kag, Tag, Vag, etc, etc...
8. All above together = truly stupid fictive names with terrible sounding.

Guardian wrote:1. Character names with same first and last name initials (Kate Kennedy, Jack Johnson, etc, etc...)

I had to laugh at this. I did this with THREE characters in my first draft. I didn't even notice the names were doing this until I started to revise. Doh!

Needless to say, I had to change a few character names.

JohnDurvin wrote:Anything involving apostrophes or named after the author.

You'll hate my book then. All my characters are a variation on my name--thin mint, macaroon, chocolate chip, samoa...I'm hungry

Even worse than my last suggestion is the hero of "Battlefield Earth", Johnny Goodboy Tyler. That's not a middle name, either--it's a cognomen. "Johnny who is called Goodboy."

Cookie wrote: All my characters are a variation on my name--thin mint, macaroon, chocolate chip, samoa...I'm hungry

As long as it's not about Ore'o and his evil twin Hy'dro'x overcoming their differences to battle G'inger's'nap and his army of g'oldfish.

JohnDurvin wrote:

Cookie wrote: All my characters are a variation on my name--thin mint, macaroon, chocolate chip, samoa...I'm hungry

As long as it's not about Ore'o and his evil twin Hy'dro'x overcoming their differences to battle G'inger's'nap and his army of g'oldfish.

Crap.

...all of the names in The Hunger Games.

The only one that isn't terrible is Rue.

All Slavic or Germanic-based names in essentially every epic fantasy book written in the past 20 years. For instance, the Eragon books. I don't want to feel like I'm coughing up a hairball every time I try to pronounce something like Blarfengar or Juttonyyrdsil, nor do I want to have to stop mid-read just to flip to the pronunciation guide in the back of the book.

Honestly people. If you find that you have to include a pronunciation guide in your book, then you're probably over thinking it. Don't test the reader's patience, because there's only two people in the world that can get away with incoherent bullspit: Tolkien and Adenoid Hynkel. Period.

P.S. I totally agree with the "Bella Swann" thing. Just when I thought I couldn't stand that book or its one-dementional characters any more than I already do....

I love Amanda Downum's Necromancer Chronicles, but "Isyllt Iskaldur" (the main protagonist's name) does NOT exactly roll off the tongue. I kept deciding every few chapters that I wanted to pronounce it a different way in my head... but I didn't like any of the pronunciations! Ugh!!

That would be Draco Malfoy.

siebendach wrote:That would be Draco Malfoy.

Oh no! Pray tell, why do you hate that name?

JohnDurvin wrote:Anything involving apostrophes or named after the author.

John, how do you feel about an author using their children's names?