Spike the LOLcat

Couldn't resist.

Wordless Wednesday: The amazing eight-legged, two-tailed, two-headed cat!

Thursday Thirteen...things about this room

Thirteen...things about this room (yeah, it's a cop-out, gimme a break, I'm having a busy week!) 1. When we first moved in here, this was the spare room, and for at least six months it was just full of stuff. I mean, there was furniture and boxes stacked chest-height all across the room. 2. It's been my office for maybe five years now, and it's usually still stacked chest-high with crap. Tidy, I am not. 3. There are five full-height and one half-height bookshelves in here, and I'm contemplating getting another one. That's fifty feet of shelf space just for my fiction books, and probably another ten or so for the non-fiction (just my history, costume and reference books; the rest are downstairs, along with the classics and some plays). I've never counted them. I don't think I can count that high! 4. But if you allow an inch or so for each book, that's about six hundred fiction. Wowsa! 5. I have two desk chairs: one of those kneely things that I use, and one normal desk chair that did my back no good. But before I got around to finding someone to help me downstairs with it, my cat too it over. It's Spike's Chair now. And it's about an inch deep in white fur. I wouldn't dream of moving it now--or sitting on it, for that matter! 6. I spent most of yesterday tidying up in here; I told you I was messy. There's a futon that's usually buried under stuff that I need to open out for my brother to sleep on when we have family staying this weekend. See, it's still sometimes the spare room. 7. I have three Spike (the vampire, not the cat, although one is named for the other) posters up here, plus a series of framed autographs of the Buffy and Firefly cast. Only half a dozen, but it's a growing collection! 8. Next to my computer is a music stand. I gave up on having a proper desk when my chronic messiness meant that I could rarely find the mouse. Now I have a little computer desk that I can't actually fit extra crap on, and a music stand for whatever books, notebooks, or notes I'm working from. 9. My windowsill holds the following: a Victorian-style doll who really doesn't have anywhere else to go; a black Cleopatra wig; a Lego Technics racing car, with hydraulic suspension (I'm a wicked Lego engineer, or was when I was about twelve anyway), an oversized Guinness hat from St Patrick's Day last year; a dog brush; my old glasses; a Grow-You-Own-Boyfriend kit; a laquered carnival mask; the 2007 Writers and Artists Yearbook; an incense holder; a foot-high wooden artists lay figure with a hair elastic around its neck; a sketch for mural I painted in the downstairs loo; and about three inches of miscellaneous bits of paper I'm too scared to disturb in case they all cascade onto the floor and bury me. 10. There's a little wooden cat dressed as a ballerina hanging on a spring from the light fitting, three small cat statues on top of one bookshelf (including one cast in bronze from the British Museum) and at least seven soft toy cats perching on various books, plus the two little Jellycats on either side of my monitor. There's also a pair of sunflowers with faces, a couple of sheep, a teddy bear proclaiming he's twenty-one (he's a rotten liar; he's four), and a seal. Oh, and a plastic tiara with fake rubies on it. And a spiral cone hat with a painted veil. Of course. 11. I have this as my desktop wallpaper. I call it First Contact. The kitten at the back with the blue eye is Spike and the one investigating is Sugar, about half an hour after we first brought them home last year. The black cat is Tinker, my old man. He died a few months after that photo was taken. 12. There's a small bowl of crystals on the shelf next to my computer: amethyst, hematite, bloodstone etc, all chosen for their various powers of creativity and concentration. Also because they're pretty. 13. At the back of the door I have a Homer Simpson poster. It says this:

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It's easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

Eight things about me

Kendra tagged me. Damn her!

Here are the rules:

1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.

2. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.

3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

4. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged, and to read your blog.

8 random facts/habits about me ...

1. I love sleeping. If anyone denies me my ten hours a night, I am a very cranky critter.

2. I've been vegetarian since I was six, but I hate mushrooms, aubergines, courgettes and avocados. They're just so slimy. Why do people insist onmaking vegetarian dishes with them? There are millions of other vegetables you could use instead!

3. I have a habit of naming pets after foodstuffs. So far we've had Honey, Candy, Sugar, and Pepper. Actually, my mum has a thing against giving animals human names, don't know why. Although I know I've read books where the heroines have had those names. All of them.

4. I spend way more time than is healthy at this computer. When I came back from two weeks away after the RWA conference in 2005, I came upstairs and gave my computer a big hug.

5. I spent five days away just before my birthday all by myself, and it was fabulous. Except I missed my cats so much I had to go and buy a little soft toy tiger to cuddle. True. His name is Roar.

6. I can't think of eight people to tag. Kendra already got a couple of my choices, damn her!

7. I'm such a big Buffy fan I named a character in each of my Sundown books after Buffy characters. When I grow up, I want to be Joss Whedon. Or at least Marti Noxon.

8. I am the whitest white girl in the world. Not only do I not tan, I don't even fake-tan. Regular fake tan is way too dark for me, and even after layers of Johnsons's Holiday Skin, I'm still only roughly the same colour as a normal person in the depths of winter. Sigh!

I am tagging... Amelia, Sybir, Kate D., Julie, Michele, Dakota, and Alysia (and ohmyGod, Alysia, your Space is making me SO hungry!), which is only seven but I can't think of anyone else.

Very little going on

...I'm trying to think of something to say about the last week. Um. Pepper has grown at an amazing rate--she'll soon be as big as me--and continues to be both adorable and annoying. I think God makes puppies cute so you'll forgive them all the crying and pooping. Much like babies. Only honestly, I prefer puppies.


Here's Pepper facing down Spike. Really, I think he was just sitting there to tease her: "Look, I've got the run of the house AND my own special-sized door AND the humans let me sleep on their beds, and you have to live in the kitchen, so nerrr!"

Um. Oh! I finished Sophie book seven, titled Dead To Rights. And I've been trying to think of promo items I can take with me to conference. Of course, the problem with promo is the speculate-to-accumulate dilemma. I haven't accumulated enough to be able to speculate yet...

Wordless Wednesday: A few of my favourite things

Do I blog about David Tennant too much?

Lazy Sunday afternoon

...got no mind for worries. Pepper has been dozing under the bench in the front garden most of the afternoon, after a hard morning of climbing up and down the three steps to the drive. Hard work being a puppy.

Sugar and Spike still aren't sure what to make of her. They've both sneaked up on her while she's sleeping, taken a close sniff, then recoiled in horror. But they haven't been aggressive, just mostly curious. Poor Pepper just wants to play with them! This has, however, helped me develop a theory on the dogs-chasing-cats idea. The dog doesn't want to chase she cat away, she just wants to play. The cat, however, is disgusted by this leggy, smelly creature, and so hightails it (literally) out of there. Dog thinks this is part of the game, and so pursues.

Yesterday, both Sugar and Spike ended up perched halfway up the oak tree while Pepper sniffed around the roots. Wussy cats.

Here she is after a hard day of being adorable:

This cushion is now part of her bed. Cushion, towel/blanket, Knotty. Poor neglected puppy.

In other news, I finished final line edits on A is for Apple, the third Sophie book, which is getting ready to go to Book Expo America. I should hopefully be getting a cover soon (I typed 'toon' there, hah!).

Now, it's absolutely glorious weather here, more like June than April, so I have some hardcore sunbathing to do. Yes, I know I said I was going to stay pale and interesting this year, but I say that every year, and it gets really tiring having people ask if I'm anaemic all summer...

Pepper Pepper Pepper!

Yep, we brought our new baby home today! She was a sweetheart and slept in the crook of my arm most of the journey. And has spent the time since hopping around the garden being adorable.

Here she is with my dad--see how tiny she is?


And here she is trying to eat my shoe while I'm taking pictures of her. I don't know what it is with dogs and shoes...maybe it's genetic. Must wag tail, adore owner, and eat shoes.


Giving me a doggy kiss on the hand. Bless.


Saying hello to Spike, who was Not Impressed. When we brought her in, I handed her to my dad and picked up Spike who wanted to see what the fuss was about. He didn't seem all that interested in what Dad was holding, until he realised it was alive, whereupon he hissed, scrambled out of my arms, and startled his sister into leaping away from Mum, scratching her finger open and knocking over the water bowl.

I feel that went quite well.


Pepper killing Knotty.


All tuckered out. She seems to like her box (and yes, that is a super-market cardboard fruit crate she's sleeping in. With an old bath towel. Nothing but luxury for my poppet).




Spike all blissed out from the catnip drops I bribed him with to forgive me.



Sugar, not looking particularly convinced.


But lest they forget, this was Sugar and Spike the day after we brought them home, poor wee mites that they were--at least they had each other!

Wordless Wednesday: The cats brought Pepper an Easter present

See? An egg. Fresh, too. Sweet of them.

I'm the best mummy in the world

It's official. My cats said so. Well, not them, but the card they gave me. Well, not that they gave me exactly, but the one my mummy bought on their behalf. But, at least my mummy thinks I'm the best! And look, Sugar must have approved, because here she is with the card, and she's not glaring at me or anything.

Anyway. Obviously, today is Mother's Day in the UK, which means that yesterday was Fathers Desperately Trying To Buy Flowers And Cards Day. Except in my house, because a) it was my birthday, b) my brother and I are quite old enough to do this for ourselves (although you wouldn't believe the times I've got a phonecall late on the Saturday before from my brother, asking if I can get him a card, because he's forgotten) and c) this year, as the year before, my mother requested no cards, no flowers (she bought me 25 purple tulips yesterday) and no presents. Well, she is impossible to buy for anyway. Instead, bro and I are making lunch and dinner for her. That's what she asked for. Oh, and obviously that we clean up afterwards.

This works fine for me, because spending money I don't have on presents she won't want is acknowledged by both of us as a really stupid thing to do. However, I will just raise my hand and boast that I did get her the best Mother's Day present ever a few years ago, when we took her to see Bryan Adams, who she adores. We're going again this year, but not today. Obviously.

What's the best present you've ever got someone?

Offski

I dunno why I titled it that. I'm not going to Russia and I'm not going skiing. Although dad and bro are. Skiing, that is.

I am going away for five days tomorrow, so won't be here until Friday. And even then, probably not a lot. Saturday is my birthday (you can send cards and flowers, magnums of champagne, etc. via my publishers, darlings) and Sunday will be spent recovering from it, so don't expect much from me until maybe Monday!

I shall leave you with these two, who already know something is up and are being deliberately adorable in the hopes I'll take them with me.



Oh, and while I'm gone, do find time to read either I, Spy? or Maneater--depending on your preference, see how democratic I am?--and tell me what you think!

ETA: oh, and yes! I forgot I was going to post the winning I, Spy? contest entry today. Well, here it is. The winner is DawnM, and here's her tale of woe.

This happened a few years ago now, just a couple of days after Concorde crashed in France, and I was due to fly out from Luton or Stansted. It was one of those rare blindingly hot, humid days that you get in England. The departure lounge wasn't so bad, not the most comfortable seating but at least it was air conditioned. After waiting about an hour they finally let us go through boarding, only to find ourselves in another lounge. This one however had even more uncomfortable seating and not enough to go round all the passengers. So, of course I'm one of those left standing. And standing . And standing. Because they wouldn't let us on the plane, or back to the departure lounge. And there weren't any facilities and no air conditioning. Well, I don't do well in the heat and by the time another hour had rolled by, I'm close to passing out. Finally, they let us on the plane, and we all think we're about to go.

Only, it turns out the plane had an engine fault, as they informed us once we were onboard, and they're waiting for a part. Now they knew all this so I can only surmise it was pure sadism on someone's part to get all of us out of the departure lounge, where we could have been reasonable comfortable in the first place. Inspires great confidence in airlines, especially coming straight after a plane crash. And of course, no engine = no air conditioning. And 2 or 3 hours wait before they get the part and get it fixed. So everyone's baking in their seats, and you're not allowed off the plane and back into the terminal. And this was supposed to be a short flight, so there aren't any drinks or food. Well, you can imagine.

Just to cap all this off, I'm sitting right at the front of the plane, just behind the pilots' cabin and the stewards' alcove. And right on the other side of me is a woman who's informed the steward that she's terrified of flying. Oh, joy! Now, having worked in hospitals for longer than I care to think, I have the medical sense of humour and can find just about anything funny in the most inappropriate situations. So I kinda appreciated the stewards take on the plane crash because I understood institutional humour. Only the problem was, they'd forgotten (maybe that's being generous they might have thought it amusing given there was someone frightened of flying in the front seat) that you could hear them quite clearly through the curtain, and their humour was morbid to say the least, and didn't go down to well with most of the passengers.

Definitely not the most pleasant flight I ever had, especially as the long delay meant that it was night by the time I got to the hotel, and the kitchens were closed.

Sophie sympathises: after all, she worked at Stansted and often experienced its erratic air-conditioning. In fact, she's such a geek she could probably figure out where you were flying to: was it Belfast, or Derry?

Dawn wins a free download of I, Spy?. Thanks everyone else for entering--there were some truly terrible tales in there!--and keep your eyes peeled for the release of my next book from Samhain, Ugley Business, due out in May.

Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Things about ME 1. I've never done one of these before so I had to go and visit the Thursday Thirteen site to figure out what the hell it was about. 2. In nine days it will be my birthday. On Monday it will be my cousin's birthday, and she's nine years younger than me. 3. I have a new book out today that I wasn't expecting until Friday! 4. I think smock dresses make people look pregnant. 5. I still wish my hair was curly, even though I know it's way more work than I could ever be prepared to do. 6. I haven't brushed my hair for about three years, not counting ruby weddings or funerals. 7. There's a black and white cat who thinks he lives in our house, even though someone else has put a collar on him. We named him Jess after Postman Pat's cat. 8. I eat chocolate muffins for breakfast. They're low fat and used to be really nice, but recently they changed the recipe so they're not. Now I'm wondering how many Weight Watchers points there are in the proper ones. 9. I first went to Center Parcs when I was about three and have never lost the sense of childish wonder I had then. In fact, I'm going back next week all by myself. 10. I have never read Pride and Prejudice. Or any book by Jane Austen. Does this mean I'm not allowed to be a romantic novelist any more? 11. My favourite song in the whole world is Fall At Your Feet by Crowded House, and has been since I was about fourteen. 12. I still can't remember which button makes a space, which makes punctuation, and which cycles through options when I'm writing a text message, even though I've had my phone nearly a year. 13. Even though I got a B in maths I never actually learned my times tables. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

Cats and Sophie and birthdays, oh my!

Remember how in June last year I posted a gushing blog about Sophie? Well, nine months later, here she is, pink and shiny and about as clever as a newborn. And I'm just as proud of her!

So proud, in fact, that I'm running a contest for one lucky person to win a free download. It's super-shiny, too. See, Sophie works in an airport--at least, to start with. And we all know airports are ideous places. In fact, I believe there is a circle of hell that very much resembles Terminal Four of Heathrow.

Anyway. What I'm asking you to do is just this. Think about your worst airport story. Or your worst air journey. Or tell me the lengths to which you've gone to avoid flying. Email them to me before Sunday 11th March, when I shall pick a winner. For more details, check my website. While you're there, check out the Extras.

Also speaking of things that happened last year, you may remember nearly a year ago a completely ballistically ecstatic post from me on the occasion of my birthday when I was given an IOU for a cat. Well, actually, I got two (no, did I? Funny, I never mention them here).

Well, today my babies are a year old! Yes, the tiny little Sugar-plum and Spikelet are officially grown-ups. And, as predicted when they were still small enough to reduce grown men to cries of, "Awww!", they turned out to be super-gorgeous.

Yes, I'm smitten with the...cats. So, happy birthday Sugar and Spike!

Oh, and don't forget to check out my March news, in case I've forgotten anything today.

Catch-up

Wow, I left it a whole week? And I still don't have a lot to report--been busy the last week preparing for not one but two releases this week! I, Spy? is out tomorrow, and Maneater on Friday. I also suddenly realised I sort of need to get working on the next Sundown book, which doesn't quite have a title yet, but is about a fae and a vampire in New York. I think.

Also, I'm going away next week for five days, so I need to...I dunno, fiund a suitcase and some clean clothes. Given the state of chaos in which I live my daily life, this may prove timeconsuming.

Oh God, yes, and I need to get my newsletter out!

In the meantime, have a cat picture. It's been a while since we had one of Sugar. Here she is, trying to figure out how the door works.


Oh, and just for fun:

Boromir
With good intentions but misunderstood motives, you are a hardy, if somewhat unreliable, companion.
I ask only for the strength to defend my people!
Boromir is a character in the Middle-Earth universe.

Busy busy

With three books scheduled for March I've been run off my feet. Well, actually that's a lie: I've been glued to this keyboard. Ought to have blogged more, but how interesting is: Got up. Did promo. Ate. Slept. Hmm?

Also, yesterday was tricky since my office is upstairs, and shortly after I went downstairs in the morning, my parents started ripping up the stairs carpet, underlay and grippers in preparation for the new carpet being laid in the afternoon. Then, of course, when the carpet was being laid, going up and down the stairs was also inadvisable. So I read my book instead.

You want to see the new carpet? I know you're desperate to. Here's Spike, trying to recreate those carpet ads (who did them? Can't remember) with the fluffy white puss sprawled on the shagpile. See?



Oh, and I did some website work: check out the profiles I made for Sophie and Luke!

ETA: yes, those boots are awesome, aren't they? They only cost about £25, too (I love cheap stuff). However, I've only just recovered from the severe pain they induced not only in my feet but all the way up my legs as I tried to balance on those heels all night!

I'm not going to mention Valentines Day

Oh bollocks, I just did.

Well, anyway. Today is important for so many other reasons. My neighbour's daughter is X years old today (yes, X, I can't actually remember and am too lazy to go back and rewrite a sentence I've already started). The TRS CAPAs, which which yours truly is nominated, are announced. It's the first anniversary of Candy's death.

Anyway. That's miserable, so I'm going to post a little quiz. Yeah, I've done it before, but since it took me five whole minutes to find an entry I posted a year ago, I reckon Blogger has given up on archiving by date so I doubt anyone'll find it.

Here's the game. You put your iPod on shuffle (or in my case, the songs my new PC managed to extract from my old one before the connection gave up and died) and they magically give you the answers to the following questions!

It's like being 15 again. Except when I was 15 my computer didn't even have speakers...


1. How does the world see you? All Saints: All Hooked Up
Am I?

2. Will I have a happy life? Buddy Holly--True Love Ways
Er, I'm reasonably sure I never uploaded Buddy Holly...but i take this as a yes?

3. What do my friends think of me? Jennifer Lopez--Ain't It Funny.
Okay, would like to point out that this is the video which I have--and that's because it has a VERY hot guy in it. Seriously.

4. Do people secretly lust after me? Maroon 5--This Love
Also a video. But actually a Buffy fan video about Spuffy. So...er.

5. How can I make myself happy? Maroon 5--This Love
Um. The song this time. I think this is broken...

6. What should I do with my life? Johnny Rivers--Tracks Of My Tears
I don't even know this song. WTF is going on?

7. Will I ever have children? Craig Armstrong: Glasgow Love Theme
From the Love Actually soundtrack. Um. Well, there are usually rosy-cheeked youngsters in Richard Curtis films, right?

8. What is some good advice for me? Girls Aloud: Biology
"The geek at your feet says you're neat and your heart beats closer..." of course.

9. How will I be remembered? Elvis Costello--Oliver's Army
Uh.

10. What’s my signature dancing song? Alicia Keys--Never Felt This Way
Not...really...a dancing song.

11. What’s my current theme song? Al Green--Let's Stay Together
Who the hell has been programming this thing?

12. What do others think is my current theme song? Abba--Angel Eyes
This one almost makes sense. Or might, if it had any actual relevance to me.

13. What shall they play at my funeral? Eve Cassidy--Ain't No Sunshine
Yes! Yes! SUCCESS!

14. What type of men do I like? Angie Hart--Blue
Better get stocking up on woad, then.

15. How’s my love life? Fleetwood Mac--Tell Me Lies
...Yeah.

Well, that was a diverting waste of time. Methinks possibly someone else has been downloading music on here. "I need it for the band." You're gonna play Al Green songs?

Anyway. Have some cat pictures:

Sugar: non temeris messor. "Fear Not The Reaper."



Spike brooding that he's whiter, softer and fluffier than that silly cold stuff outside.

Look what I got for Sophie! Actually, go and look at her MySpace, it's so blingy right now. And! Oh God, this is scary--I got a countdown thingy for I, Spy?. 33 days? Argh! I'm still doing edits!

In other news, do you think Spike is doing this deliberaely to be cute, or that he just can't help it?

911

No, not American emergency services. A 1990s boyband. Who my friend Alysia used to be mad about. And who were playing at Chicago's in Bishop's Stortford on Friday (yeah...not quite Wembley or Shea Stadium, is it? The stage is smaller than my kitchen). And I made the mistake of telling her...

Anyway. All I can say is I've never been to a gig where the band threw out freebies like these before. I am now the proud owner of a 7" dildo, courtesy of 911. And yes, I asked them to sign it. And yes, I was sober.



On another note, we did have cause for an emergency last night when Spike didn't come home and we realised none of us had seen him since Saturday afternoon. Cue much panic, not helped by my mother outlining the possible scenarios (he's trapped, he's hurt, he's been stolen, or he's dead. I felt so much better for hearing that). An especial fear was that we live about 50yds from a main road with three pubs. What if someone, leaving the oub on Saturday night, had picked up this friendly white cat and shoved him in a wheelie bin for a joke? Those bins get colelcted on Monday morning.

Which had me rushing around stuffing flyers through everyone's door begging them to check their bins, sheds and garages. We were just on our way back from doing the immediate area when my brother called: a neighbour just down the road had found him in the garage, safe and sound, if a little hungry.

Little beggar's hardly left my side since. Except when he tried to follow my dad into the garage earlier...

'No photos, please!'

New blog template

I know, aren't you excited? I bet you're so thrilled you're compiling a list of the differences. I know I am.

Okay, nothing else to say. Got a new confuser--I mean, computer--and have spent most of the day swearing at it. I was going to post a picture of my exciting new haircut (it's blonder! And marginally shorter than before!) but since I really, really can't be arsed to search out the software that comes with the camera upload...you'll have to wait.

In the meantime, here is a picture of David Tennant. (I transferred a discful of all my most important files over this arvo. Am intending to link the two PCs together so I can copy all my files, but for now it's essentials only--stories, bookmarks, photos of Sugar and Spike, etc. Daivd came courtesy of my trawl for a screensaver...)

More on names

...including the ever-popular How Can I Fit My Cats Into This Conversation game. Well, how, you ask? By telling you that Spike's name was cause for some serious thought. He's only the second male pet I've ever had (two female dogs and three female cats preceded him and Sugar). The first, my darling Tinker, was quite simply the gayest cat in existence. He was beautiful, dapper, and effeminate, and I've no doubt that this was due in no small part to the fact that when we got him and his sister, Willow, we thought we had two girls, and christened him Tinkerbell (I was six, okay?). By the time we discovered our little fairy was actually a boy, and shortened his name to Tinker, the damage was already done. For the last few years, I called him Tinkerbell. He minced.

Consequently, when we acquired Fluff & Fluffier, I was determined to give my boy cat a butch name. I'll make a man of this one, I decided. I'm not going to gay him up. So I called him Spike. Spike. Like the dog in Tom & Jerry, or the henchman in Storm Front, or yes, even my favourite vampire. It's a good manly name, is Spike.

Unfortunately, then my gorgeous boy turned out to be heartbreakingly pretty and has spent most of his ten months being cuddled and pampered. As a result, he's turned into a total mummy's boy who, last night, allowed a strange black and white cat into the house. Twice. While his mummy chased the bugger out, Spike hid under the kitchen table.

But then again, Spike the vampire was a mummy's boy too. Maybe I'll call my next cat Pansy and just have done with it...

Anyway. Names, as I said earlier in the week, are important. The naming of a character is a difficult matter and I know I'm not alone in saying it's sometimes hard to write a character if they don't have the right name. Sometimes the name pops up with the character, fully-formed--Luke Sharpe, for instance, turned up in my head without any name changes. So did Chance in Almost Human, although I do remember that when I first created her father, it took me bloody ages to come up with Striker. Now, of course, I can't think of him being called anything else. It's the same with Sophie. She actually started out life as a Sally, but that never quite suited her and it wasn't until she got her new name that I could really write her.

Her surname, however, was something of an accident. Sophie Green. I really just wanted a name that was ordinary, easy to spell, and wouldn't make anyone look twice. Only later did I realise quite how appropriate it was: Sophie's as green as can be. Luke, on the other hand, didn't end up with his surname by accident (quite apart from the fact that it's damn funny to say out loud). I wanted a name that fitted him as a character: sharp-eyed, sharp-minded, sharp-shooter. He's even a sharp dresser. There's nothing soft and fuzzy about Luke--well, not until you know him better.

I have been known to name characters deliberately using words that fit them as people. I have a work-in-progress with a character named Harker. Say it out loud: it's a harsh, sharp word; an onomatopaeic name (did I spell that right?), for a man who doesn't have much space in his life for softness. Similarly, when I came across Dare as an abbreviation of Darien, I knew I had to use it for the devil-may-care hero of She Who Dares (yes, the title came later).

It's a trick a lot of worthies have used. Dickens famously gave his characters outrageous names which perfectly suited them. Look at Bill Sykes: he was a psycho. And William Makepeace Thackery did it to perfection in Vanity Fair with another Sharp, this one Becky; the steadfast Dobbin; the odious Sir Pitt Crawley. In more modern times, the great Pratchett has given us Sam Vimes, a grubby, disreputable name; and Bernard Cornwell his eponymous Richard Sharpe (see, it's a good ol' name, isn't it?).

Incidentally, I read the other day that there's a high ioncidence of people taking on jobs which resemble their names. Geographers called Geoffrey, and dentists called Denise, that sort of thing. I guess this means I should be living in a cattery...no wait, I practically do...

What other examples of clever naming do you know? And do you know any characters who've been terribly badly named?