Quickie Post - Baby Names

No, this is not a baby announcement. I just happen to be a baby name collector, for that time roughly 5-7 years from now when I begin seriously thinking about beginning my own brood. Nieves showed me the most original baby name book I've seen in a long time, and I just had to share it with all of you.

It's called A is for Atticus: Baby Names from Great Books by Lorilee Craker.
Paperback: 9781599950204 $12.99

It's wonderful! Each name has a little paragraph next to it placing the name in history and in literature (and even throws in some pop-culture references). Lorilee even thoughtfully talks about the crossover of names from male to female and vice versa, or ambigender names (of which I'm a big fan).

Because I'm not planning on having babies for at least 5 years, I'll share with you some of my personal favorites. Some of these I found in this book, some of them have been in my head for years.

Scarlett Auden (called Auden, though, not Scarlett)
Scarlett is for Scarlett O'Hara - Scarlett by Alexandra Ripley, the sequel to Gone With the Wind, is one of my favorite books of all time. Auden for W.H.Auden.

Barrett Phinneaus
Honestly, I just like both these names. Perhaps I'll call her Phin for short. Not sure yet.

Loren Jude
I've always loved the name Loren spelled this way. Jude is a family reference - my mother loves the Beatles, particularly the song "Hey Jude". When she and my father were dating, he used to sing it to her - with one little change. My mother is Jewish, so my father used to croon, "Hey Jew" instead.

Lucan (no middle name for this guy yet)
One of King Arthur's Knights of the Round Table

Joscelyn Roarke
Joscelyn is the name of one of the heroes in a favorite series of mine - the Kushiel series by Jacqueline Carey. It's wonderful fantasy fiction series (two trilogies make up the entire series), with amazingly researched and then fabricated world wars and religious history and great political intrigue, amazing plot and character development, fantastic sex, humor and adventure. Couldn't put them down. Am crying the series is over. Roarke is a name I've always loved, but particularly as the incredibly dreamy and dangerous husband of Lt. Eve Dallas in the "in Death" series of books by J.D. Robb (a.k.a. Nora Roberts - yes, I read her, don't judge me).

Lastly, I really want the middle name of a child to be Blake, for William Blake, one of my all-time favorite poets, but I don't have a first name yet. I'm not sure Lucan Blake works. Jury's still out on that one.

Feel free to write in and share your favorite names too!

-Rebecca