October Novel Prep Challenge

So here I am on Day 1. Since my story has science fiction and fantasy elements in it, I have to make up a bunch of names.

And I spent longer agonizing over the names than I did on the actual exercise.

Now, people who know me might say "But I thought you were more creative than that!" No. I'm not creative at all. I have to force it.

Folks, J.K. Rowling made it look easy: Not all of us can come up with a Hogwarts or a Dumbledore. This is why she's rich and I'm not. Names. (Well, names plus I was bitten by a radioactive sloth, and my superpower is laziness).

I even tried a bunch of different online randomizers. None of them provided even a spark. I tried Google Translate to come up with appropriate words in other languages. No luck.

I fumed and watched Luke Cage for a while. Now there's a name. Luke. Cage. Doesn't get much simpler or more powerful than that. Conveys everything it needs to. (His original super-name, Power Man... well... not so much).

Stan Lee didn't create that particular character, but Stan Lee's superpower was naming: Peter Parker (genius!), Quicksilver (perfect!), Galactus (wow), etc.

Worst part is, I know I shouldn't be getting hung up on naming at this point. I can use placeholders and replace them later. But then I know, beyond a sliver of any doubt, that I will muck it up when I go to write, and confuse myself while editing. Because I've done it before.

Anyway, that's my rant. Maybe naming comes easy to you. Maybe it doesn't. But it makes my brain hurt.