The four of them

[skip.knox]

I have thumbed my thesaurus. I have read my Roget. I've interrogated the Internet. Now I'm fussing in a forum. I'm not really asking a question, so feel free to not really answer it.

My WIP has four young people as the main characters, ranging in age from twelve to fifteen. I'm having trouble with my collective nouns for them. One can say "children" but that makes them sound too young. "Adolescents" is actually dead on, and appropriate for an alternate-history world in which Latin is the common tongue, but it just doesn't sound right to modern ears.

"Young people" sounds like something straight out of a College of Education. "Youths" is a little abstract and anyway evokes "My Cousin Vinny" too readily. "Teenager" is accurate but is too modern and anyway one of the kids is only twelve. Juvelines? Youngster? Ugh.

I can only lean on "they" and "them" just so long, and anyway that gets nondescript quickly. "The four" works, but is readily overworked. Naming all four is too clumsy. Saying "Hille and the others" or "Reichert and the others" makes one sound like a leader.

Would it be wrong of me to kill three of them just to solve a relative pronoun problem?

 

[Feo Takahari]

What task have these four assembled to complete? Is there a nickname you could give them related to that task?

If there isn't, "youths" sounds like the best available option.

 

[skip.knox]

Mmm, I like the idea, Feo, even though I don't think it works here. Makes them sound too much like a team. Yes, they hear there's a treasure hidden under a city, but they don't really know it's there until they see it. They try to rescue someone but wind up captives themselves.

There is a possibility here, though. I'll have to chew on it a bit. In this world, there is Civilization and there is the Wild (orks, wolves, were-creatures, the lot). Every six years, there's something called the Wild Hunt (lifted straight from Middle Ages but flipped on its head). The Wild Hunt is happening even as these four go about their adventure. It's at least possible they could name themselves the Young Hunters or something like that. A bit overblown, but they certainly could view themselves as being the equivalent or alternative to the Hunters, who are all grownups. I could lowercase that and have it appear in the narration though they never call themselves that.

Something to consider, anyway. So, thanks. *click!*

 

[A. E. Lowan]

Would it be wrong of me to kill three of them just to solve a relative pronoun problem?

If you're asking, and it's not all just tongue-in-cheek, are all four important enough to keep? And since you have a group, why doesn't one emerge as a natural leader? Or there be a power struggle? Cooperation is not a given in any group, and throw in young people of various ages and you have insta-conflict.

 

[Helen]

Tweens ?

.

 

[GeekDavid]

The group, the traveling companions, the party... most of the collective nouns used for adults in fantasy literature could be used here.

 

[ThinkerX]

To me, this is really glaringly obvious, but...

do they share an organization in common, be it a school or guild or gang?

In that case, something like 'the apprentices' or the 'squires' might work.

 

[Graylorne]

I know the problem, working with MC's in the same age range. Luckily, in their case there is a leader. But most often I write around it. 'Hraab ran away and the others followed'.

Speaking about leaders, in every group there is one. Not always the same one, that depends on the moment, the task etc. So you could say the one time X and the others, the other time Y and the others, depending on who has the initiative. As long as you'd change the names often enough, you'd be save.

 

[Philip Overby]

Are there jobs or skills that you could identify them by? Like "the mage" or "the bard?" I agree that using nicknames like Feo suggested could also help. It might help to know a bit about the individual characters to identify them as a certain kind of group or something. I know you mentioned they're not really a group, but if they're traveling together they must have something connecting them.

 

[skip.knox]

Thanks to all for the feedback. There's an awkwardness or tension when it comes to questions like these. One doesn't want to burden the forum with entire plot summaries just for a specific question, yet without sufficient context many questions elicit 'how the hell do I know' kind of responses, and rightly so. I've noticed a tendency to be brief and let follow-up questions flesh out what's needed, so that's what I did here.

The four characters, in brief:
Niklot, son of Count Mathys von Gruenwald
Lyse, a ward of the Count
Hille, a bargegirl whom Lyse befriended last spring
Reichert, a Supplicant who is trying to get admitted as a Novice to the Chapterhouse (oh all right, mages guild)

Hille's the youngest (12) and the most impetuous, with the brand of courage peculiar to that age
Niklot is the oldest (15), eager to show he is a grown man
Reichert and Lyse are both 14. Lyse has had a troubled past (orphaned, kicked around, isolated) and is utterly determined to get out of being betrothed by her rather predatory guardians. Reichert is a straight arrow earnestly following all the rules with little to show for it.

When the opportunity for an adventure comes along, and with it at least hints of wealth and glory, each of them has reasons for going along as well as reasons to hesitate. Well, Hille never hesitates, but the others have their reasons.

So, no, there's no organization or group. These four are not quite ad hoc, but neither are they associates. They're not even from the same social class.

The suggestions given do help, though. All are much appreciated.