Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/35900
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/35900
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Weird names are fine and tolerated, my personal rule is to ensure there is no ambiguity in how the reader should pronounce them; and "Nyuna" does have that problem, it is not certain whether to try and pronounce the "Y". The sound is more important than the spelling I think, so I'd ditch the "Y", with "Nuna", or "Nuuna" if you want the first syllable drawn out a bit.

That said and following that rule, I do use weird names, often ancient actual names and foreign myth names few people would recognize, or vaguely recognize (e.g. "Heraud" appeared before "Herald" appeared before "Harold"). I do that to constantly emphasize the "foreignness" of my setting, or to bring special attention to my hero, or both.

You may be instinctively doing something similar; a distinctive name makes a character special. Everybody with distinctive names makes the **setting** special.

One more general warning on names, however, is to keep yourself a cheat-sheet of names you have used, both for lookup of characters you haven't written about for awhile, and as reference when you need to make a new name: try not to re-use an existing name, and try to make any NEW names not easily confused with a previous name, either by spelling or the sound of the name. (Some readers rely on spelling, some readers hear the words they read as if spoken in their head).

Original score: 6