TV, Movie and Book Names

Gently old-fashioned stand-alone nickname that owes its popularity to mega popular Abigail.

Bruce is a Norman place name made famous by the Scottish king Robert the Bruce, who won Scotland's independence from England in the fourteenth century. It's perennially popular in Scotland, but has been rarely used here for a generation -- though the impact of Bruces Lee, Springsteen, Dern and Willis, as well as Batman's Bruce Wayne -- still lingers. At one time Bruce was so widespread in Australia, it became a nickname for any Ozzie man. An interesting alternative is Brix, the Normandy place name where the Bruce family originated.

Clark seemed to have been Gone with the Wind, but parents looking for a short, strong boy's name are now beginning to appreciate its cool combination of Gable charm with Superman power.

Jethro, though the biblical father-in-law of Moses, has suffered for a long time from a Beverly Hillbilly image, but some really adventurous parents might consider updating and urbanizing it and transitioning it into the hip o-ending category.

Kent is a no-nonsense, brief, brisk one-syllable name, almost as curt as Kurt.

This spelling variation of Leya was popularized by the Star Wars films, but is still firmly in the US Top 1000 many years later. This spelling is also probably preferred as it is clearer in pronunciation to the original Hindi name, Leya (which sometime gets pronounced Lee-ah).

Luke is a cool-yet-strong Biblical name with a relaxed cowboy feel, which has been on the rise since the advent of Luke Skywalker.

A quaint and quirky flower name, until recently considered a bit too prim for most American classrooms but brought back to life in recent years by the attractive character of Primrose "Prim" Everdeen in the Hunger Games series. In the Top 300 girl names in England and Wales and on Nameberry, Primrose remains rare in the US, but is made more accessible by a raft of sweet nickname options, including Rosie and Posy.

The new Randy -- though a bit commercial, as in Rand Corporation, Rand McNally, et al.

When Marion Michael Morrison became John Wayne around 1930, his last name took on an air of cowboy cool that lasted about thirty years, but by now it's strictly a dad or granddad name.

A zippy little international name. The Hebrew name relates to the month of Israeli independence, while the Slavic Ziva (also spelled Živa and Siva) is a goddess of love, life and fertility.