Naming Characters by Marilyn Meredith aka F.M. Meredith

Today I have a very special guest blog by my good friend and fellow author Marilyn, aka F.M., Meredith.  Marilyn always has great advice, and her words of wisdom in this post are no different. 

Naming Characters

Even when I’m giving a prize winner’s name to a character, I like to make sure that name fits the

person I’ve created. In most cases, it’ll be a minor character who probably won’t appear again. Of course if someone told me they wanted to be a suspect or even the murderer, I’d be glad to do as they desired.

There are many ways to choose characters’ names.

One of the characters who has been in every book in the Rocky Bluff P.D. series, is Officer Doug Milligan. I have a favorite cousin named Doug and I always liked the name as I like the character. Milligan seem to fit for his last name. Often that’s the way it happens, the name just comes to me.

When I first knew I wanted to introduce a black police officer, I chose the last name Zachary. This was the surname of a Camp Fire leader I knew years ago. I don’t really remember where the name Felix came from, but Felix Zachary has been an important character for many books in the series.

When I first began writing my Tempe Crabtree mystery series, I borrowed my great grandmother’s name because it seemed to fit for a Native American or Indian as she prefers to be called.

Marilyn at the PSWA conference 2015

When I’m writing about a person with a definite ethnic background, I’ll visit a website with names from that culture and try to find a first and last name that seem to go with the character as I see him or her.

For the really bad villains, I like to choose odd names. In A Crushing Death one of the bad guys is named Omar Padweitz, another is Elford Lemus. At times, I’ve used much more common names for other reasons.

If I, through some strange coincidence used your name for an unlikeable character, I apologize. I assure you it wasn’t done on purpose.

Speaking of names, I love Holli’s. Think about it, Holli Castillo could be the name of a movie or TV star, or a famous singer. Guess what, Holli writes great mysteries and also creates short films.

If you’re an author, what is your way of choosing character’s names?

Marilyn aka F. M. Meredith

A Crushing Death

A pile of rocks is found on a dead body beneath the condemned pier, a teacher is accused of molesting a student, the new police chief is threatened by someone she once arrested for attacking women, and Detective Milligan’s teenage daughter has a big problem.

Bio:

 

F. M. Meredith, who is also known as Marilyn Meredith, is nearing the number of 40 published books. Besides being an author, she is a wife, mother, grandma and great-grandmother. Though the Rocky Bluff she writes about is fictional, she lived for over twenty-years in a similar small beach town. Besides having many law enforcement officers in her family she is counts many as friends. She teaches writing, loves to give presentations to writing and other groups, and is a member of Mystery Writers of America, three chapters of Sisters in Crime and on the board of Public Safety Writers Association.

Website: http://fictionforyou.com

Blog: http://marilynmeredith.blogspot.com

Facebook: Marilyn Meredith

Twitter: MarilynMeredith

Purchase at:

http://www.amazon.com/Crushing-Death-Rocky-Bluff-P-D/dp/1610092260/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457618775&sr=8-1&keywords=A+Crushing+Death+by+F.M.+Meredith

Contest: Once again, the person who comments on the most blogs during this tour, can have a character named after them in the next Rocky Bluff P.D. mystery. Tomorrow you can find me here:

http://bkstevensmysteries.com/category/thefirsttwopages.com/

Marilyn Meredith- Twelve Question Tuesday

Today I welcome Marilyn Meredith to Twelve Question Tuesday.  

1.  Please tell me the three most important things people should know about you. 
I have a big family, my five children gave me eighteen grandchildren and thirteen great-grands and I enjoy being with them all. Writing is my passion. I’ve published thirty-five books, mostly mysteries.

2.  Are you a dog person or a cat person?
I’m a cat person. We have two inside cats, brothers, Butch and Sundance. Because my husband feeds all strays, we have too many outside cats. We live in the country and strangers think it’s okay to dump off the cats they don’t want. It isn’t okay.
 
3.  Tea or coffee?
My favorite is Chai latte which I can make at home. But when I’m out and about I adore McDonald’s vanilla flavored iced coffee.
 
4.  Boxers, briefs, boxer-briefs, or commando? (Either what you prefer or what you prefer on others.) 
Since I don’t wear them, I don’t really care. I’m at the stage in life when it comes to anything I put on my body it has to be comfortable.
 
5.  What was the first thing you ever wrote?
The very first story I put on paper was in pictures. It was my own version of Our Gal Sunday, a radio soap opera my mother listened too. I didn’t know how to write words yet. When I was a bit older and able to read and write, I wrote an illustrated story about fairies that I actually sent to a publisher. It was rejected of course, but nicely.

6.  When did you finally decide to call yourself a writer?
Probably not as soon as I should have.  When I was in grammar school, I wrote plays for the neighborhood kids to perform in. In middle school I wrote and illustrated a teen magazine which I sold for a nickel to my friends. When my own kids were in school, I was the PTA newsletter editor for four years and wrote plays for my Camp Fire Girls. Though I wrote some short stories and two full-length novels that did not go anywhere, it wasn’t until I wrote and rewrote a 500 page historical family saga (that eventually got published) that I thought of myself as a real writer.
 
7.  Which of your works are you most proud to have written?

I always think my latest book is the best one. I’ve been proud of all of my published works, but I keep learning so I think each one is better than the last. So, that means Spirit Shapes, my latest Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery is my best. But I recently finished my next Rocky Bluff P.D. crime novel, Murder in the Worst Degree, is the best.
 
8.  What is the scariest thing that has ever happened to you?
Most of the scariest things happened when I was a kid. I went off on my own far too often without telling anyone where I was going so things could’ve been even scarier. I’ve been lost in a neighborhood I didn’t know, had a man try to molest me on a streetcar—hit him with a heavy book and he got jumped off the streetcar, when I went inside my house when no one was home, discovered an intruder, while babysitting someone tried to break in, and I could go on, but won’t.
 
9.  How did you end up getting published? 
When my historical saga was finished I sent off to one publisher after another (this was long ago when you sent the typewritten manuscript off in a box with another box inside with a return address and postage), rewrote which also meant retyping (no computers back then) all 500 pages about every fifth rejection. I was nearing thirty rejections when I got an acceptance.  (And I’ve had plenty of rejections since then, but I’m not easily discouraged.)

10.  Would you be food or fighter if the zombie apocalypse were to happen?
I’d definitely be a fighter—I’d be fighting to protect my family.

11.  What is the most daring thing you have ever done? 
I was on my way to pick up my son from high school and when I drove by a local park, I saw four men carrying a young woman off. She was screaming and fighting.  I stopped the car, jumped out and went running toward the group, swinging my purse and yelling. The men dropped the girl and ran off and she ran in another direction. I got back in my old VW bus and went on to the school. As a mother, I was a fierce avenger of anyone in trouble. It wasn’t until I was a middle-aged grandmother, I realized I probably was neither strong enough or scary enough to take on bad guys by myself.
 
12.  Would you rather be rich or famous--and you could only have one-- and why?  The fame would be based on something good, not something like being the best serial killer or anything like that. 
Being recognized as a writer would be good. It is frustrating to pour so much of yourself into your work and not be known as a writer except by some of your peers and a few fans.
 
Blurb for Spirit Shapes: Ghost hunters stumble upon a murdered teen in a haunted house. Deputy Tempe Crabtree's investigation pulls her into a whirlwind of restless spirits, good and evil, intertwined with the past and the present, and demons and angels at war.

Bio: Marilyn Meredith is the author of over thirty published novels, including the award winning Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series. She borrows a lot from where she lives in the Southern Sierra for the town of Bear Creek and the surrounding area, including the nearby Tule River Indian Reservation. She does like to remind everyone that she is writing fiction. Marilyn is a member of EPIC, three chapters of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and on the board of the Public Safety Writers of America. Visit her at http://fictionforyou.com and follow her blog at http://marilynmeredith.blogspot.com/
To order:

http://mundania.com/book.php?title=Spirit+Shapes
 
Also available on Amazon