Compiling an Index

I'm happy to say I've worked on various parts of Ripples for the last few days. Yea! I'm so happy to be back at it. The glossary and index are coming along well enough that I should be able to upload them to Wattpad soon. They should help online readers decipher meanings and fill in blanks.

I finally decided on the names each clan uses for their creator deity. This deity isn't the only one worshipped by the people of Y'Dahnndrya, but is the true deity and the one worshiped by my main characters. This deity is gender-less because it doesn't matter since sex is not a part of the deity's existence, other than creating beings who procreate through intercourse.

The pantheon worshiped by the Sekot Mundei is based on the five moons and two suns of Y'Dahnndrya who do have genders assigned to them. Since there's so much background, an index or an appendix is certainly going to be a big help to readers. Hopefully, it'll be a joy to read through just to learn more of the less-talked-about things.

Names of God - Otherwise known as "How The Heck Am I Going to Come Up With So Many Names?"

I read a lovely retelling of the Cinderella story several weeks ago, Chasing Cinders by Elizabeth D. Marie, in which she calls the deity 'Creator.' I toyed with the idea of keeping that for the name of my deity throughout the book, but honestly, with there being six clans who each have their own language, a change was required. So I dug and dug and researched a bit more. Then I visited Google Translate to translate some creation-like words and phrases to see how they sounded. And voila! Each clan has now has their own name for the single creator deity. There are other gods and goddesses worshiped by some of the clans but they don't come into play until later in the series.

I think I owe Elizabeth a big thank you. I had fun doing the research and creating the modifications. And all in all, I think the names I chose work pretty well. Here's the run-down listing the name (pronunciation for sticklers)/Clan it's aligned with/meaning I searched for/language origin:

• Azilet'zal (ah ZEE let' zahl) - M'Neshunnaya - thread of life - Hungarian
  
• Kai'yanga (KIE' yahng ga) - D'Koruyi - creator - Maori
  
• Tugansol (TOO gahn sole) - Shinnoah - life giver - Irish
  
• Andurdrao (ahn DOOR drow) - Genzet - breath of life - Icelandic
  
• Changjo'ja (chahng JO' jah- Bot'ha - creator - Korean
  
• Kwikrei'ya (kwee KRAY' yah) - Ikehl'dur - one who creates - Catalan
  

I hope you enjoy tidbits like this. If you're a writer also, I hope my method might help you in your writing some day. I've had people ask me if I use name generators but I really don't like them very much. I enjoy digging for names and then playing with the spelling and syllabication. Name generators may make the job go faster, but in the end they steal some of the fun.

The above photo is one of the open source elements I used as inspiration for Levanna Stone Temple, one of the destinations in Ripples.