This character is a female serial killer from the 1920s. She was a beautiful girl, tall and slim with dark brown hair and big blue eyes, from a very wealthy family with a long line of suitors. She married one of those suitors, who was very devoted to her, but she cheated on him with someone else. Because her family was Catholic, they would have disowned her if she got a divorce. So, she took the easy way out: killed her husband. She got away with it for two years, eventually moving in with her boyfriend. Then, she found out he was cheating on her. She caught him in the act, killing both him and his mistress. After that, she killed more people, between 25 to 30, mostly targeting married couples and single, wealthy men. [name]One[/name] of those men fathered her only child, a daughter, but she killed him, too. The woman was finally caught in 1931 and executed via electric chair in 1932. Her last words were, as she handed a letter to the minister in attendance, “Give this to my daughter–for when she is old enough to understand.” The press, law enforcement, and historians have dubbed her the “[name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]”: beautiful and deadly
What would you name this woman? First, middle, and last name
Also, if you have any name suggestions for any other characters, feel free to add them. Thanks everyone!
A cool tie in might be using a name that means rose, such as [name]Rhoda[/name], or one that means black or has a connection to black, like [name]Odessa[/name] or [name]Dahlia[/name] or [name]Melanie[/name].
[name]Dahlia[/name] [name]Rhoda[/name] [name]Hughes[/name]
[name]Rhoda[/name] [name]Odessa[/name] [name]Hughes[/name]
[name]Melanie[/name] [name]Rose[/name] [name]Hughes[/name]
For her daughter, maybe a name with a positive meaning or a virtue name, to combat the dark nature of her mother?
[name]Lucille[/name]
[name]Prudence[/name]
[name]Amity[/name]
[name]Verity[/name]
And for some of the men:
[name]Simon[/name]
[name]James[/name]
[name]John[/name]
[name]Thomas[/name]
[name]Nicolas[/name]
[name]Love[/name] your story, it sounds so cool! [name]Just[/name] one thing I noticed is that she seemed to have a perfectly normal childhood, and with serial killers, this is not the case. As she kills men who cheat, why not make it so that her father cheated on her mother? The more extreme, the better, I believe. Good luck
I would name her [name]Gladys[/name] [name]Claire[/name] [name]Quimby[/name].
Later she became: [name]Gladys[/name] “The [name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]” [name]Quimby[/name] [name]Penrose[/name].
Her first husband: [name]Gary[/name] [name]Shepherd[/name].
Her boyfriend, following the death of ol’ [name]Shep[/name]: [name]Jonathan[/name] [name]Walsh[/name]
I found this passage in More Than [name]Night[/name]: Film Noir in its Contexts by [name]James[/name] Naremore (now that I think about it, Naremore strikes me as seeming like a really cool surname), discussing the femme fatale archetype in the noir genre, that seems like it might be somewhat relevant. (It’s on page 19 if you’d like context for the quote, and sorry if I’m totally off in bringing this up!)
“By the same logic, the noir heroine is no [name]Doris[/name] [name]Day[/name]. Borde and Chaumeton never allude to the [name]Marquis[/name] de [name]Sade[/name]'s Julliette, one of the most famous sexual terrorists in all of French literature, but the character they describe resembles her in every respect save the fact that she is “fatal even to herself” (10). Beautiful, adept with firearms, and “probably frigid,” this new woman contributes to a distinctive noir eroticism, “which is usually no more than the eroticization of violence” (10). Her best representative on the screen, Borde and Chaumeton argue, is [name]Gloria[/name] [name]Grahame[/name], who, even though she was seldom cast as a femme fatale, always suggested “cold calculation and sensuality” (125).”
With that in mind, what about Julliette, after the character from the [name]Marquis[/name] de [name]Sade[/name]'s [name]Justine[/name]? Another variant of the name ([name]Julia[/name] comes to mind) could also be a good and less obvious option. Maybe even [name]Gloria[/name]?
This may be cheesy, but I also like the idea of [name]Virginia[/name] for her, and it would have been a very commonly used name when the character would have been born. I also like the idea of using a nickname for [name]Virginia[/name] ([name]Ginny[/name], [name]Ginger[/name], maybe even [name]Vera[/name]) with her full name rarely used, perhaps being brought up mainly when other characters are commenting on the irony of it.
I like [name]Evelyn[/name] a lot too. That would be very timely and appropriate. Or maybe [name]Lila[/name]?
Names that come to mind when I read this are:
[name]Violet[/name] [name]Teresa[/name] LaFord
[name]Maureen[/name] [name]Alexandra[/name] [name]Graham[/name]
[name]Colette[/name] [name]Rose[/name] [name]VanDyke[/name]
[name]Nicole[/name] [name]Fiona[/name] [name]Black[/name]
[name]Vyna[/name] [name]Millie[/name] [name]Grey[/name]
[name]LaCie[/name] [name]Anne[/name] Mootz
[name]Janet[/name] [name]Marie[/name] Fernandez
[name]London[/name] [name]Susie[/name] [name]Asher[/name]
[name]Hope[/name] I could help! [name]Happy[/name] writing!
I can see her being a [name]Scarlett[/name] or an [name]Ivy[/name]. Probably a very traditional middle name, like [name]Caroline[/name] or [name]Mary[/name].
I could see a [name]Viola[/name]. Dark, seductive, and cold hearted. What’s her background? I know you said she came from a wealthy family, but is her family English? French? Some other Eurpoean country? That would help.
The “[name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]”
[name]Viola[/name] “The [name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]” [name]Jemima[/name] Bloom
[name]Imogen[/name] “The [name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]” [name]Louisa[/name] Koslov
[name]Winifred[/name] “The [name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]” [name]Ruby[/name] Cavendish
[name]Amabel[/name] “The [name]Black[/name] [name]Rose[/name]” [name]Ophelia[/name] Pavlov
Her First Husband: [name]Arthur[/name] [name]Joseph[/name] [name]King[/name]
His Mistress: [name]Zelda[/name] Rochard
I could see her as a [name]Charlotte[/name] - it was a fairly common name of the time, and [name]Charlotte[/name]'s always sounded like a dark-haired beauty to me. A [name]Charlotte[/name] could definitely have an edge to her.
