Hey there~ Thanks for the question. Choosing names is a pain the ass. Back when I used to do original RP stuff in mIRC, my RP partner sent me a book of baby names cause I was so damn terrible at it. I still use it on occasional, but primarily I use name generators and baby name lists via find on Google, especially for the non-American names. Sometimes I’ll just tab to a website I’m using and see what male names on there, or think of the name of someone I worked or met recently. I have asked my readers for names, which was helpful.
Stephen King once said that he uses the phonebook for names, which I should probably start doing. My brain tends to default to the same names – James, Rob, Markus (which confuses me, I’ve never even met anyone named that). Some names I rarely use. I still associate the name ‘Steve’ with that ‘90s board game Dreamphone (my sister was in love with him). I don’t like using the name Will because of negative associations I have with that name, although I’m rather neutral about William. I rarely ever use my dad’s name, Michael, because ew.
The thing with names is that they have to match the characters too. Some names sound soft (Sasha), some names some uber-masculine (Caine), some names sound feminine (Lucien)…some names are kind of hyperbolic. Everytime I use the name Magnus I giggle a little inside. Names can also imply nationality (Jean-Pierre), religions (Mohammed), cultural backgrounds (Eric vs DeShaun), etc. Any pup on Tumblr can tell you how important choosing a pup name is.
My favorite names to use are Julian and Gideon and Fin. If anyone wants to PM me your name, I’d be glad to see if I can fit in somewhere.
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