Write Away

I normally write fanfiction, but I'm fond of throwing minor OCs in, and they and their names have to fit the story. For normal names, I use generators and phone books, a holdover from the Sims (naming a household always took forever). Sometimes it takes inventing a background to justify the name, and I really enjoy doing that. I'm writing something from ACD Sherlock Holmes, and I had a French first name Portuguese surname pop into my head, and I decided she should be a dressmaker's apprentice who was the daughter of a Portuguese immigrant father and English mother, but she was born while visiting the mother's distant relatives in Burgundy. That actually makes writing the character a bit easier, since they were wealthy enough to vacation fro that time, so maybe the daughter works because she enjoys it, maybe the father's a merchant, etc.

I guess names are pretty important to me, because they jump start a lot of the world-building and background.