Having self-published more than 34 books, I’ve always been fascinated by some of the names fiction writers come up with for their characters. I suspect that, like me, they use real names of friends and family.

Heroic characters, men or women, do not present as many problems as child molesters or serial killers. Not that some bad guys (and gals) are always bad. Some unsavory characters do have redeeming qualities and often become allies — of a sort — of the heroes.

But one must be very careful when using friends or family for inspiration. Nobody wants to be a pederast. Aunt Millie or Uncle Jack might object. (And if you know people who want their names so used, don’t let them near the grandkids.)  

I often look around my office for inspiration, usually on the spine of various books. I haven’t named anyone “Fred Thesaurus” yet, but by combining an innocuous first name with the surname of an author, one is usually safe.

However, since most of my books are now packed away in boxes for an impending move, that avenue has temporarily dried up. But not to worry: There’s always Google Translate! It will convert any word into just about any language you can think of, which is especially great when naming slimeballs.

I usually stick to words without umlauts or Cyrillic characters (although Google Translate also provides phonetic interpretations). German is always a good fallback. For example, Hans Spinne is a great villain name (spinne means spider in German). I haven’t used it yet, but it has promise. Or how about Jules Araignée (araignée is French for spider) instead?

By the way, spider is “laba-laba” in Acehnese, whatever language that is. This is why I stick to German and French. In fact, Google’s list of languages is so large that it boggles the mind. I mean, who speaks Abkhaz, Batak Simalungun, Cebuano, Limburgish, Nyanja, Tamazight, or West Frisian, to name a few of the tongues available?

On a lark, I asked Google how many military operations the United States has been involved in since the American Revolution. The answer astounded me: more than 100. Of course, that figure contains banana wars and some minor conflicts, such as the Philippine Insurrection. But it also includes the biggies, like the Civil War, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Spanish-American War, both World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam.

That’s almost as many as the languages listed on Google Translate. I don’t think we ever fought the Western Frisians, but who knows? I better Google it.

Lawrence De Maria has written more than 30 thrillers and mysteries on Amazon. His research now has him wondering if the people who speak Limburgish eat a lot of cheese or just smell bad.