Names again...

I hate coming up with names. It is so important to a story, both for characterization, as well as flow.

This trouble I have even extends into my personal life, as I agonized over the names I gave my children. My youngest's name was even left so much to the last minute that we had to poll the nurses to see which name they liked the best.

So I have agonized over my main character's names for Empress, as well as the name of her country, city, etc. I think I am happy with her name as Syndra-Kai, but if you have suggestions, please feel free! Right now, I have my hero's name as Malik-Tobar (after much consulting of the baby name book mind you). Once upon a time it was Vin-Malik (the Malik part seems to be sticking with him), but I already have a character in another book named Vincent, and he's stuck with that. So maybe a little help here too? Any ideas? Well, maybe you need to get to know him more... I think I want to stick with hyphenated names for people, but of course those can always be shortened to nicknames...

As for place names, I think I have settled on the country, as well as the head state, being called Lunatia, and the capital Lunatium. Very Latinesque, so not so far removed from reality that a person can't identify with this place. Here are the rest of the "states" and their capitals...

Cathantias, Cathannum
Peranthias, Peranthium
Engana, Engannum
Arcuatia, Arcuatium

(credit here to the place name generator found at: http://nine.frenchboys.net/country.php for inspiration)

Of course, I still need a name for the mountains, any rivers, the oceans, and the other main continent that surrounds Lunatia (see previous post), but its a start