There are those who call me... Tim?

[rj_anderson]

It has been suggested to me that I change the name of my young hero from book two of FAERY REBELS (a.k.a. REBEL in the UK). I am told that for most British people, especially of the younger generation, the name "Timothy" is considered fairly radically uncool.

I don't mind Timothy's name being unpopular, because he was born to missionary parents and raised in Uganda, and him not fitting in with the cool kids in England is kind of the point. However, if it's going to make all my young readers in the UK gag and put the book down hastily the moment they see it (as I'd be tempted to do if the hero's name was, say, "Leslie") then I suppose I would be foolish not to take that into account.

So I'm doing a poll. The first question is specifically for UK readers, but for the second I'd be glad to hear from anybody.

[Poll #1398565]

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Comments

[alison23.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, I understand how the connotations just come with the character, so it tells the audience something about the character as soon as they hear it, which people from other places may not get. I used to work with a lot of people from Asian countries who would take American names here trying to fit in better, only many of them didn't quite get the connotations of the names they were choosing--they picked names like Sherwin and Melvin that no American today would be likely to choose, but probably had no idea those names were out of style.

By the way, my brother-in-law's name is Timothy & he goes by Tim! :) I don't really hear that name much, though. I can only think of one other Tim that I know.

[tybalt-quin.livejournal.com]

By the way, my brother-in-law's name is Timothy & he goes by Tim! :)

Oh knickers. I knew someone would end up related to a Tim ... ;)