Preparation

Hey guys, just a question that popped into my head the other day - how important do you think surnames are in your stories?
I realized recently that I pretty much never use them. Unless a character is always referred to as Mr. or Mrs. So-and-so, a lot of the time I'll never write down the surname or even think one up, it just never seemed that important to me.
Most of the books I've read lately though DO have full names stated near the beginning, and so it dawned on me that perhaps, that's the way it should be....
Opinions welcomed :-)
I think this all come about when I realized that I didn't know a friends surname - despite the fact we've been pals for 3 years now I've never needed to know her surname until now! lol

http://vyanae.blogspot.com/

I don't there is any way that it should be.

I think I come up surnames for my main characters so that I can get a bigger sense of who they are.

It sounds like the surnames of some people just aren't relevant to your story and if they aren't then I think that's fine.

No Excuses. Just Write.
SoCNoC - Untitled Chick Lit
Freeing the Flame - 30,065/40,000 words rewritten for May

yes I think it depends what genre. If its fantasy like people from other worlds, or with dragons and such, often the names are unusual (and sometimes hard to pronounce) and rarely a surname.
I have used them where a story is about family and generations, but a fantasy I did for the January novella I think I mentioned the MC's surname at the beginning, the other characters didn't need theirs known.

Got a plot and Title for Socnoc 2008.
"To Be Or Not To Be: That Is The Question."

Books are Humanity in Print!

I agree that it just makes sense where it's important.

However, I do what Kerryn does and write down their full names on my notes anyway just to give me more of an idea of who they are - even if I don't ever write them down in the novel, it helps me.

(The funny thing is, my two previous NaNo novels had the main character's full name in the actual title. I think I like full names.)

Andrew Chilton - http://kapiti.geek.nz/
SoCNoC 2008 - Unknown and Untitled

I'm with everyone else, I always give characters a surname even if they never get mentioned in the story. I write a lot of Asian characters so it's fun to choose meaningful names that match the characters or their occupation, e.g. one character is called Wei Qi Feng, he's an archaeologist and 'wei' means 'hoe' or 'spade'.

Surnames are our family and culture, not so long ago (at least in Europe) people would judge you by your surname. So I think it's always good to at least keep a surname in mind for your character - even if you never use it on paper :)

http://blog.yam.com/venomouswest

Good point surnames stemmed from their trade or 'son' of. My birth name e,g Mawson, son of Maw, now I am son or Sen of Lars, which is Norwegian.

Got a plot and Title for Socnoc 2008.
"To Be Or Not To Be: That Is The Question."

Books are Humanity in Print!