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McAnally's (The Community Pub) => Author Craft => Topic started by: gravesbane on November 11, 2015, 02:11:44 PM
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First off thanks for reading this post.
Number one: I am having trouble naming two characters in my novel. I am almost finished and I would like to give them names other than name1 and name2. They are Japanese and are uncle and nephew. They are also craftsmen. Creating names for my characters always seems to be the hardest part of writing. :-\
Second: Can anyone recomend a good example of a treatment for a novel. I have found many descriptions of what a treatment is, but no examples. I want to be prepared for when I submit my novel to an agent.
Thank you again for reading this post and giving me any advice.
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Number one: I am having trouble naming two characters in my novel. I am almost finished and I would like to give them names other than name1 and name2. They are Japanese and are uncle and nephew. They are also craftsmen. Creating names for my characters always seems to be the hardest part of writing. :-\
Japanese names can be easier than many cultures because they have a tradition of basically cramming common syllables together, as opposed to what amounts to a historic list of pre-approved cultural names that we have in the West. There are a bunch of random Japanese name generators online (huzzah for anime fandom). Id suggest just clicking through them until you find a pair of names that you think fit together for their given names. As far as a Family Name goes, you have a couple options. A random one from a generator could be fine, or you could go looking for a particular word/phrase with it's own significance. I tend to name purely by the feel of the sounds, myself. But naming them for a craftsmen/artisan Caste (Chonin?) or any number of words associated with the families historic craft (japanese swordsmithing has lots of interesting jargon), which would be the equivalent of the Bakers and Coopers and Smiths of the western world. Or you could make them descendants of some historic figure, such bloodlines and dynasties are particularly prevalent, culturally speaking; Hattori Hanzo is a popular one.
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;)
Second: Can anyone recomend a good example of a treatment for a novel. I have found many descriptions of what a treatment is, but no examples. I want to be prepared for when I submit my novel to an agent.
Basically, the treatment is the Morgan Freeman voiceover detailing your story before you write it. There doesn't need to be dialogue; it's just a narration of events. You remember the synopsis of the One Ring in the LotR, where we hear how and why it was created, when Sauron lost it, and how Gollum came across it? It was a story telling narrative without dialog that could have been fleshed out into a full story, but instead was short and sweet.
That's your treatment. It's supposed to flesh out the bones (outline) of your story so that it an actual story, without making it a novel. If you can do that, and maintain your own interest in the story to go back and write the full thing, it's supposed to help.
Personally, I haven't done that. I also suffer from major editing because I change my mind about plot direction and character roles as I write, that I might not have to deal with if I did a proper treatment. I'm trying it with my latest project, and we'll see how it goes
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I like the Olympia trick for the name problem. Open up the wikipedia page for the Olympic team of the country you are looking for and mix and match the names you find there. You can even go by years, to see what might have been popular.
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Thank you one and all for your ideas and sugesstions.
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I like the Olympia trick for the name problem. Open up the wikipedia page for the Olympic team of the country you are looking for and mix and match the names you find there. You can even go by years, to see what might have been popular.
cool. cool. cool.
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I like the Olympia trick for the name problem. Open up the wikipedia page for the Olympic team of the country you are looking for and mix and match the names you find there. You can even go by years, to see what might have been popular.
Or you can use names from historical figures related to your setting/topic. If you read David Weber's Honor Harrington series, AND happen to know a few names of who's who in the space sciences, you will see a lot of (last name) connections. Mr. Weber clearly uses lists of space science inventor/researcher last names for a lot of his characters. He also re-used a lot of names between the one-shot Path of the Fury and the Honorverse series.
So, even if you do not claim any sort of relationship between your characters and the real life characters with similar names, anyone who DOES know the history of the art will recognize that you, the author, see a connection.
(Jim does this with Harry as well, but it's a LOT more obvious.)
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(Jim does this with Harry as well, but it's a LOT more obvious.)
Or vague tributes, like Ronald Reuel.