About the names of the characters in Icebox....
I do not pick names lightly. I think about them for ages. The names that the characters end up with usually have some significance to me as the writer, though it's not necessariy something that I intend to pass on to the reader.
So if I say that, for instance, Unity's surname - Siddorn - is derived from an archaic word for 'shroud', and that that's pertinent to her character and function in the novel, I'm not suggesting that I expect any reader to know that, or that it's necessary to know it in order to get the most out of the book. It's just that the name means something to me, and it informs the way I write the character. Because of that, the choice of name doesn't have to be externally justifiable, as it were. I might call a character Basil because the word always reminds me of churches and the character is a vicar - and that completely idiosyncratic reference is enough for my purposes.
However, in some cases the name is pertinent to the novel in a much more concrete way. The scientist in Icebox, for instance, who promotes cryonic suspension after death is called Gabriel Todd. The surname is an echo of the German 'todt' - so Gabriel Todd is the Angel of Death.
The character Casey Rushmore invents his own name, just as he invents himself - and his choice is explained in the text.
Unity Siddorn. As I say, her surname is derived from an old word for 'winding sheet' or 'shroud'. Her first name is a reference to the idea in cosmic physics that there might be a single unifying theory that explains everything. When I started the novel, I thought it was going to deal with a wider range of 'hubristic science' than it actually ended up addressing, so I gave my fearful everywoman scientist a name that encapsulated all that.
Don Osman got his name simply because it amused me that one so cynical, hedonistic, humanist and profane very nearly shares a name with Donny Osmond. This eventually becomes a plot point - friendless in London, Gabe tracks Don down because he has a memorable name.
Willie Rabblestack, who is absolutely central to the story, was put in at first only because I knew that later I'd want to introduce his mother, Ma Rabblestack, who had come to me fully formed when I thought of her name. And I thought of her name when I was idly doodling on a notepad during a dull meeting. But for the introduction of a 'c', Ma Rabblestack is an anagram.
David Jennings, the self-effacing copper (who features much more prominently in Mischief) takes his surname from a former Tottenham Hotspurs soccer player - as do all the policemen in the book. I wanted him to have a very dull, unremarkable name. It's also the name of a schoolboy character I used to like when I was a kid.
Robert Spleen is so-called simply because I wanted to call his company Splendid, and I worked back facetiously from there. However, this is a good example of name influencing plot. I doubt I would have caused him to develop various cancers of his internal organs had I not given him that name.
Ellen is a sort of cypher - she's mysterious in a way that allows men to project onto her any ideal they wish - hence the echo of a generic 'elle' and the connection to the Greek Helen. I might insist that I gave her the surname Faustinelli just because I happened to be working in Holland with a woman who had that name. But that would be disingenuous, of course. In a novel, everything that makes it on to the page is there because a decision has been taken - so I must at some level have figured that it fitted her and her role. Where Casey is the agent of chaotic plot in the book, Ellen is the agent of calculated manipulation.
