If you like the Irish surname feel, there are loads of more congenial options.

Roone is a lively, attractive and unusual redhead entry brought into the mix by the late TV sports and news executive Roone Arledge, who seemed to own it as a one-person name when he was alive.

Actor Pierce made both his first and last name appealing.

Cashel is one of the many appealing Irish names that have not yet emigrated to the US. Cashel was chosen by actor Daniel Day-Lewis and his writer-director wife Rebecca Miller for their son.

Irish name with an intriguing lilt.

Fallon was one of the first of the unisex surname names, but thanks to "Dynasty" in the 1980s it now has a feminine image. For a boy, try Phelan instead.

While Larkin takes this name from bird to surname, there are actually more female Larkins these days than male, and it's a name that works as well for either gender. It has the literary connection to poet Philip Larkin too.

A jovial and jaunty Irish name, the title of a long-gone TV crime drama, this would make an appealing choice. Slight downside: Maddy is already a mega-popular nickname for Madeline/Madelyn and Madison, so this Mad- name might not feel as distinctive as the stats would suggest.

An X-ending surname less common than the Jolie-Pitt-inspired Maddox. Grandparents might still associate it with the old TV crime show. 

This is an old Irish name associated with such heroes as the seventeenth century chieftain, scholar and poet Manus O'Donnell. It is likely a variation of Magnus, itself derived from the Latin word for "greatest", though the literal Latin translation of manus connects it to the hand, and more figuratively to work, fighting, violence, writing, and a group of soldiers.

Officially a shortening of the traditional and tricky Gaelic Fionnghuala/Fionnuala, Nuala makes a lovely choice all on its own. Nuala is well-used in Ireland.

Has a legitimate first name history in its native land and an appealing meaning, but pronunciation is far from obvious.

Sadbh is the modern Irish form of the more streamlined but equally confusing Sadb or Sadhbh: these names are pronounced to rhyme with five. In Irish mythology Sadb or Sadbh or Sadhbh, a goddess lover of Finn McCool's, was turned into a deer only to vanish and (somewhere in there) give birth to Oisin.

A few decades back, this name -- which hardly shows its Irish roots -- evoked a man in a gray flannel suit; now, though still upscale, it's more likely to be attached to a female.

Lash might look an unexpected English word name, associated with eyelashes or hitting, striking, whipping, or heavily criticizing someone. It is however a Romani name and a form of the regal Louis, meaning "renowned warrior".

From Haruki Murakami's Kafka on the Shore, the story of a boy named Kafka -- crow in Czech.

This authentic form of the name of an Irish mythological hero with the power to make women fall instantly in love with him would work far better here as the Anglicized Dermot.

Virtually unknown in the U.S., yet with its jaunty o ending and similarity to the stylish (yet unrelated) Remy, Remo may find some new followers.

One of the more subtle occupational surnames, Sayer is a pleasant, open, last-name-first name, particularly apt for a family of woodworkers -- or writers.

Tamsin is an offbeat name occasionally heard in Britain and just waiting to be discovered here. U.K. actress Tamsin Greig is a star of the show Episodes, Tamsin Olivier is the daughter of Joan Plowright and Sir Laurence Olivier..