Why is this name stuck in my head?

Hi everyone, well I'll make this brief. I'm naming a character, my main character. One of them at least. The problem is I have a name stuck in my head for him and it won't go away. Its as if the character itself is beating my cerebral cortex while screaming "JUST USE THIS NAME!" and that name happens to, quite literally, be Dust. Character is a male and I don't feel like the name fits but, it won't leave me alone. Its like an annoying itch that won't go away. Any advice? Should I just go for it or take a break for awhile? The story is science fiction by the way.

 

Use it.
Don't like it? Change when something better comes by.

If you make it a problem you might get stuck in your writing and then you will have a real problem.

 

By stuck you mean writer's block or just too annoyed to continue?

 

Or just good old procrastination over a trivial problem. That seems to happen a lot.

Use Dust. Either it grows on you, or it's easy to change afterwards.

 

Could it be a nickname, seldom seen? Maybe it's used as a taunt, employed by parties opposed to your character. Maybe it recalls something unpleasant from his past.
Although, I tend to agree with @Lemie. Just let him have the name for now, and move past it.

 

It would strike me as a rather silly name if I were to read this in print, even in sci-fi. My suggestion is find something else.

Mind you, if Philip K Dick can get away with a MC called Horselover Fat, then maybe I'm wrong. Bare in mind I chose not to read this book, because of that name.

 

Use it. Why not? I have a writer friend who is a huge fan of making verbs and nouns into names. (So far she's had Cascade, Leaf, Char and in a collab we never finished, she had Myth, Ever Fall, Fable, and my characters were Ruin and Briar) With this same friend we wrote a collab we actually finished and our characters' surnames were Fade and Lost. However, "Lost", though I personally like it, seemed to be a bit confusing for a lot of people, who thinks my character's lost something... Oh and then there's Cipher and Aura from the same book. Currently I'm planning a new WIP with characters called Rune and Sky. I don't yet have this character but at some point I wanna call a character Dew.

So, Dust? Go for it!

 

Thanks for all the replies everyone. Right now I've decided to use Dust as more of a code name unless I decide to keep it as his actual name. The more I think about it, the more it starts to kind of fit considering his profession is steeped in death and destruction.

 

I had a similar problem—

Had a character named “Zach.” The problem was, I had another character named “Jack,” and they were love interests. Made romantic scenes incredibly awkward and hilarious.

“Zach” was Japanese, so I ended up changing his name to something more culturally appropriate.

It felt very weird. For a long time. Because in my head, he was still “Zach.” It’d be like if your best friend Bob suddenly announced his name was Jerry; it takes a while to get used to.

But you do get used to it, and the “wrong name” feeling eventually goes away. Eventually it’ll be like his new name was always his name.

 

Then keep it. It could be in his backstory that it's his nickname, and few people know his real name.

In high school I worked with a guy named "Damage" and didn't know his real name 'til years later.

 

I agree. I'm working on a High Fantasy novel, and even I'm just working with tentative names at the moment. Later on, when I further develop the language rules for my world, I may change some names then, but for now I just want to give everyone/everything some kind of name just as a placeholder.

 

My character's nickname, "Jester," came to me long before I ever found out his given name, "Vincent." It worked well because Jester was his callsign in the Army, and it stuck, though recently my story has started to change where his given name has risen to greater prominence. I suggest you run with "Dust" as a placeholder until something better comes along.

 

It's happened to me a few times. When I was a kid, I thought this girl was called Kelly, when her name was actually Kayleigh.

Then there was this girl in my church called Helen, but for some reason I was convinced she was called Rachel. Another girl in my current church is called Theodora, whom I'd called Sylvia for the longest time.

And most recently, there's a girl called Shara in our church and everyone calls her Shar-ra. Then two months or so ago I found out her name is actually pronounced Share-ra - like Sarah but with an Sh at the beginning. This is made all the weirder 'cause everyone who knows her says her name wrong.

 

Keep Dust for the time being. You can change it later. Anyway, I don't think it's too bad and probably wouldn't bat an eye if I saw it in a novel.

 

I've read lots of books with unique names inspired from one word, and played a fair few RPGs like the final fantasy series, Cloud and Squall comes to mind. Just run with Dust, it could always be short for Dustin.