Actually there's an even better source for character names: your local phone book. If you want to go completely random, you could blindly pick one page for the last name and another for the first name. And yes, I will, occasionally, use the name of a friend for a character ... but that option does have it's risks. Unless that friend is completely indifferent as to the characterization and dialog of "his/her" character, you could easily have that friend wanting to edit the manuscript. ["Do you really think I would have said or done THAT??"] Bad enough that you're going to have to put up with edits and comments of your editor. If I do use a friend's name for a character, I don't let them see the manuscript until all of the edits are completed, and the final manuscript is in the hands of the publisher. All said, its much easier to just pick names (at random, or based on ones that either sound 'interesting' or match your sense of the character) from the phone book, and then spend all of that extra time you save on your plot and story arc.
I know I do this for my scripts, but I pick the first name of some random person's name in my 'Spam E-mail folder' and I combine it with a last name in the phone book, as what Ken Goddard mentioned in the above post. You do want to be careful with the events your character goes through if the name is a factual one (or someone you know, e.g. friend, family member, enemy )
Calihan, you can do what McGee did on NCIS and use variations of your friends' names. Or you can do something like the following: From: Wikipedia The hero, James Bond, was named after an American ornithologist, a Caribbean bird expert and author of the definitive field guide book Birds of the West Indies. Fleming, a keen birdwatcher, had a copy of Bond's field guide at Goldeneye [his Jamaican estate]. Just remember to do a spell check before sending in a manuscript. There, instead of their.
I can't speel to save my life Thanks but I do have one problem with the phonebook idea, I want the character names to be reflective of their backgrounds.
Sounds like you're back to the more time-consuming task of Googling a selection of the background terms and then making a selection from what pops up. BTW, I echo Dynamo1's comments: a manuscript filled with mis-spellings is extremely likely to be rejected as an 'unprofessional' submission. Better practice up with that spell-checker!
I love finding names for my characters I get really excited about it. I find the book of baby names is cool for first names *blushes*. You can find some really unusual and some very common ones in there. Do you have your book typed up on your PC? Maybe you could upload it somewhere and post a link? I'd love to read. I've never even thought about publication... I've written a book of sorts about living with a relitive with cancer (my mom) and the ups and downs of life around that; the hospital visits, argumants etc. But I really admire you for going for your dreams. I don't think I could. Good Luck. Jodie x
I would strongly encourage anyone who reads this website and dreams of writing/publishing a novel to put yourself in front of your computer and try. There's a lot of satisfaction to gained from making the effort ... and even more when you first see a copy of that book in the bookstores with your name on the front cover. I would be the first to concede that it isn't an easy thing to do [in point of fact, I really don't want to sit in front of my computer this evening and start working on another chapter; it would be a lot more fun to watch a movie instead], but it is doable ... especially if that story has been churning around in your head for a while. When authors get together, the one story that everyone seems to have in common is the effort it took each of us to get our first book written and published ... and the related fact that none of us wanted to approach the end of our lives regretting the fact that we hadn't tried. Like I said: doable. You just have to sit down in front of that computer and allow your story to flow.