What's in a name?

Where do I come up with my characters' names?

Katrina - THE TRAZ

KATRINA - protagonist of my BackTracker series. When I started writing this series, Hurricane Katrina was ripping apart the southern U.S.A. Young Katrina seemed to stir up trouble wherever she went, so the name just naturally became hers.

Katrina - FIREWALLS

SHRUG – the undercover cop who recruited Katrina to the biker gang in The Traz. I was looking for a short name because I had to type it so often. At the time, I was very shy about my writing and every name I came up with belonged to someone I knew, which I found embarrassing. As Shrug was a less-than-stellar constable, I wanted to make doubly sure no cop would think I was writing about a real officer!  I figured no one in the tangible world would be named Shrug. The explanation in the story about how he acquired his nickname is a tad more exciting.

KINDLE – Sergeant Kindle, the wise senior office in the BackTracker series, was named long before eReaders were invented. He’s probably a little shocked that Amazon would name theirs after him! I chose Kindle as, again, I was looking for a name that couldn’t possibly belong to someone in real life. I was at the cabin taking a break from writing, contemplating a campfire and looking for kindling…

Chordelia -

SCHRÖDINGER’S CAT

CHORDELIA – also known as “Chorie” in Schrödinger’s Cat. I have no idea where her name came from. I must have channeled it from another universe.

LADESQUE – the female heroine in my latest release, Dispassionate Lies. Again, a made up name. I wouldn’t want any of my friends, family, fans or acquaintances to think I believe them to be asexual, or hypersexual as sometimes seems the case in this near-future novella.

Ladesque - DISPASSIONATE LIES

For more information about me and my novels, and for purchase links visit my Amazon author page

Eileen Schuh, Author
DISPASSIONATE LIES
FIREWALLS
FATAL ERROR
Schrödinger's Cat
THE TRAZ

Who's Schrödinger’s Cat?

My first published novel, Schrödinger’s Cat, will be released in 2011 by Wolfsinger Publications. But, who the heck is Schrödinger and what’s with his cat?

That’s what my hapless heroine asked when confronted with that phrase. It all has to do with quantum physics, believe it or not.

“Oh, I thought you meant cat, like pussy cat,” Chorie said.
“I do mean a pussy cat.”
“Quantum physics has pussy cats?”

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Yes, quantum physics has a cat. A cat trapped in a box. A cat that is neither dead nor alive. It all started like this:

The tiny building blocks that make up matter, like electrons and photons, have dual personalities. Scientists can do experiments that prove these quanta are not particles but wave functions. Unfortunately for those of us who are rational, they also can do experiments that prove they are not wave functions but particles. Quantum physicists learned to live with the ambiguity and declared that it was the observation of these entities that determined which face they showed to the world.

Along about that time, Schrödinger said something like, “Wait a minute, guys. That makes no sense at all. Suppose you put a cat in a box and then you shoot an electron at it. Suppose the box is rigged to kill the cat if the electron turns out to be a particle and not kill it if it is a wave function. What happens to the cat until an observer takes a peak to see which face the electron showed us?”

Everyone went something like, “Oh, yeah. You’re right. There must be something wrong with our math. With our experiments. With our equations.”

Then along came Everett. And he said, “Wait a minute, guys. Your theory is correct because everything that can possibly happen does happen. Each possibility splits off into a new dimension. Schrödinger’s electron is both a particle and a wave function. The cat both lives and dies. The observer sees the cat both dead and alive. This is my Many Worlds Theory and it gets rid of Schrödinger’s troublesome cat and lets you keep your math and science and ambiguity. For in one world the electron is a particle and the observer finds the cat dead. In another world, the electron is a wave function and the observer sees the cat alive.”

Or something like that.

Schrödinger’s Cat by Eileen Schuh—a psychological crime thriller than spans two universes. Coming in 2011 from Wolfsinger Publications.

Stay tuned for more information on my writing career—and on Schrödinger’s nasty feline.

Eileen Schuh, Author
FATAL ERROR
Schrödinger's Cat
THE TRAZ