A secret about
Tobin

When my editor read an early draft of my story called Gwinna, she had many wonderful suggestions.

“This little owl is really a character too,” she said. “Why don’t you give him a name?”

I had never thought of that. There were other owls in the story too, but that little owl was special. He is the one who perched on Gwinna’s arm and led her through the forest.

I made a list of names, whatever came to my mind. Nothing seemed right. Then I looked in a book about naming your baby. It has a long alphabetical list of names for both girls and boys. I rummaged around in the boys’ list, looking for a name with a certain ring to it. When I got to the T’s, I found Tobias and variations like Toby and Tobie. When I started saying those names out loud, “Tobin” popped out. It wasn’t there in the list, but it was close. Tobin! Yes. That’s it.

In my imagination, I already knew that Tobin is quite small for an owl, and his feathers are white. But in books about owls, I found no owls exactly like him. None of the small owls is white. The Snowy Owl is white, and the Barn Owl is light in color, but both are much bigger than Tobin. So I had to decide whether to be true to nature, or not.

From back cover of Gwinna

I decided to be true to his character, especially since he now had a name of his own. The story of Gwinna is a fantasy. That means anything can happen, so long as it makes sense within the story.

So even if there is no owl exactly like him out in the “real world,” in the world of the story, Tobin is free to be who he is.

What if my editor had never said, “Why don’t you give that little owl a name?”