About using authentic historical name for teenager material
I am writing a (short) story set in Ancient Egypt, and the intended audience are junior high-senior high school students in the US. I am trying to use authentic Ancient Egyptian names for the character, I can find a lot here. But my colleague warned that using foreign, difficult names like "Amenhotep" will be unattractive to teenagers in my target audience. I disagreed because I think authenticity and exoticism is part of the attraction of a story, but I am wondering if perhaps my colleague's advice has a valid point.
Do you think using authentic, difficult name will be hard to attract teenagers? Is authenticity important when writing for non-adult audience? Which one is more important in this case, using reader-friendly names or authenticity? Do successful reading material for my audience normally use authentic or easy names?
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1 answer
Don't dumb down. A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a dictionary for?
If you're that concerned, add a list of character names with pronunciations at the beginning or end of the story. (If you have a sprawling list of characters, like LOTR or Game of Thrones, a one- or two-sentence bio won't hurt either.)
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