You Decide!!! - Writers Forum

oxleywanabenovelist123 · 07-02-2006, 04:52 PM

I am currently starting to write a series of hopefully 7ish novels. This series will be very loosely based around videogames such as Grand Theft Auto and Driver etc but novel based and with my own storylines, places and characters!!

But i am struggling to decide on place names like cities and towns etc.
also character names - i would like around 30 characters in each book with some appearing in more than 1 so lets call that 200 character names.

i need names of gangs, families, characters, cities etc any help would be much appriciated!!!

many thanks in advance for all that help

oxley123

FrankBlissett · 07-02-2006, 07:18 PM

You can always make dummy names as placeholders, if that's all that's holding you back.

-Frank

mammamaia · 07-02-2006, 08:07 PM

you're supposed to be the writer, so it's up to you to provide the names for your locales and characters... if you can't, maybe you shouldn't be writing?

fyi, keep in mind that if it's not 'loose' enough, you'll be facing major lawsuits...

to find names and places all you have to do is browse phone books or check out various lists of people/towns/cities via google... if you want ethnic names there are lists galore of both first and last names...

this is the slogging part of being a writer... people get paid to do the kind of 'providing' you're asking for here... you want others to come up with 200 names for you!?... you gotta be kidding... get googling, kiddo, and YOU decide!!!

hugs, maia

gatoatigrado · 07-02-2006, 09:23 PM

Quote:

hugs, m

i thought you didn't write anything for violent writing (?). maybe you're not familiar with grand theft auto?

it wouldn't be my choice for a book anyway. the whole concept is rather shallow and only fun (for some people, not me) in a game. I don't think it would make a good movie either, for that matter. You should choose something that goes "deeper" into characters. as a writer you should have something you are trying to convey. maybe you have an idea you're not sharing, and I don't mean to shoot it down immediately. as for names, I'd go with Frank's suggestion. You can use fields in Word (if that's how you like to write) so that if you change a name all instances change.

mwd · 07-02-2006, 09:41 PM

Finding names will be easy.

What won't be easy is the fact that you're planning to do ... seven books, with 200 characters in total. That's going to be a massive amount of work. Have you ever completed a novel before? Keep in mind that a novel is going to be, lets say 80k-100k words. So for a series of seven books, we're talking 560k - 700k words in total. That's a lot.

I don't want to sound discouraging, just I figure you should get your toes wet before drinking the whole pond. How about you just write one book for starters? That means you only need 30 names, and most of those names won't be important, since they'll be for minor characters.

Realistically you'll only need a handful of names, then. Not to mention that names are pretty utilitarian. The story itself is much more important. You can think of names as you need them, when the characters are actually introduced to your story.

cabbageguy · 07-02-2006, 10:49 PM

Well, cut it down from 7 to one book, or a short story, to start off with. Get used to writing.

As for names, there are many ways. You can pick a name randomly. You can get one that's onomatopeic, for example, Scratcherton for a dirty guy or something.

You can pick names that signify something. You can look up first names and their meanings. You can get last names from Greek, Latin, or whatever language the character speaks. One of my stories had a guy named Medvedsky, which I got from Russian - "medved" means "bear", and the guy was bear-like in his strength.

For names of cities, try something from Spanish, or if you can find it, Cherokee or another native American language.

CZ · 07-02-2006, 11:13 PM

Buy a baby name book, or hit the library (the name books should be around 929 in the Dewey Decimal System IIRC). At the library, go ask reference for an atlas of the world.

mammamaia · 07-02-2006, 11:18 PM

Quote:

Quote:
hugs, m
i thought you didn't write anything for violent writing (?). maybe you're not familiar with grand theft auto?

i didn't write anything for this guy... what i've said is that i don't help anyone with work that has violent content, but i didn't really help him, either... just told him he should be doing his own 'thinking up' of names and places... that's just basic advice for a beginning writer, not really helping him to write violent novels, which is what i'm sure he has in mind...

iamlikethiswithoutcoffee · 07-03-2006, 03:08 AM

This site could be what you need. There is a random name generator and you can specify nationality and gender.

http://www.behindthename.com/

Omnisu · 07-03-2006, 05:49 PM

And don't be afraid of NAME STEREOTYPES. If the guy acts like a Joe, it's okay to call him Joe! Stereotypes can be your best friend for all the minor characters; especially if specific side characters are stereotyped differently depending on which main character you're following at the time.

CroZ · 07-04-2006, 02:39 PM

Quote:

. I don't think it would make a good movie either

GTA and driver are based on movies.
GTA: not so great.
The Driver: one of the best films ever.

Also, GTA VC's story/setting is mostly based on Scarface.