Thursday, December 11, 2008

Names

I'm dithering over whether or not to change the name of my hero in the thriller I'm writing about a police negotiator. I've called him Jack Nightingale, and while I love the surname I'm not sure about the Jack. I wondered if Jack was a tad old-fashioned, so I hit the Internet and within seconds discovered that Jack has been the most popular boy's name in England for the past thirteen years! Who would have thought it! So I guess maybe I'll leave it as Jack Nightingale because none of the other names in the Top Ten work for me. For anyone interested, the Top Ten in 2007 was Jack, Thomas, Oliver, Joshua, Harry, Charlie, Daniel, William, James and Alfie.

Oh, Mohammed slips in at number 17, which is a reflection of the way the UK is going...

Alfie Nightingale? Definitely not. Bit too Cockney. Joshua Nightingale. A bit gay. Oliver Nightingale. A bit too Eton. Nah, I think it's got to be Jack.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Stephen - reading the "How I work" section of your site, and your little rant about Windows/Word/Microsoft. Quite agree with you. Which is why I don't use Microsoft/Windows/Word. I use Linux. you don't need to buy any new software, just find someone who knows what they're doing, and get their help to choose a flavour of linux (there's lots of them out there - I suspect which one you go for will be determined by which one will run Final Draft and other programs you use) and then get OpenOffice - its very very similar to Word/Excel (etc.) and will handle all your existing Word/Excel files. And best of all, you don't need to pay a penny. Its free - free as in you don't need to pay for it, free as in free of license.

Love the books - reading "Dead Men" at the moment - and looking forward to reading your other ones! Keep writing!

Stephen Leather said...

Thanks so much for that! I really should explore Linux, everyone says it's so much more efficient than Windows. I wish that Sony would offer it as an alternative when you buy their computers.

Anonymous said...

You're welcome.. although, to be honest, I think its possibly a good thing that Sony don't offer it installed. If they did, you'd more or less be dictated to by their choice. As it is, now, you can find someone who knows what's what about the different flavours of linux, and who can sort you out one that's going to work best for you. As for more efficient... well.. I think it is. But then.. I'm biased. :) Good luck with exploring it! (and I look forward to it making its way into one of your books!)