Literature Names

State name Alaska stems from an Aleutian word for the land mass itself. The number of baby girls named Alaska has doubled in the past five years, and is sure to continue increasing as more place names are annexed as baby names. Wilder but as habitable as Dakota or Cheyenne, Alaska is a girls' name choice for the future.

As all good Anne of Green Gables buffs would know, Avonlea is the fictional Canadian town created by L. M. Montgomery that Anne Shirley considers home. The literary creation inspired a real Canadian town to adopt the name. Avonlea would make a lovely literary choice for any baby, and would fit in with the Ava and "-lee" naming trends right now.

Katniss Everdeen is the heroine of the popular Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins, whose name comes from the (very real) edible aquatic plant of the genus Sagittaria. Katniss's father tells her that if she "finds herself," she'll never go hungry. Other unusual botanical names in the series include Primrose, Posy, Rue, and Clove, all for girls. Several of the boys' names come from ancient Rome: Cato, Seneca, Flavius, Caesar. Katniss the name has less appeal than Katniss the heroine, though it's definitely more attractive than Renesmee.

Laura is a hauntingly evocative perennial, never trendy, never dated, feminine without being fussy, with literary links stretching back to Dante. All this makes Laura a more solid choice than any of its more decorative counterparts and one of the most classic girl names starting with L.

Miles, which has a permanent veneer of cool thanks to jazz great Miles Davis, is a confident and polished boys' name that's an American classic. Always ranking in the US Top 1000, it's been drifting up the charts for the past half century but has never been TOO popular.