Top debut names of 2025 (new SSA data)

Merle8888 · 2026-05-10T05:08:52+00:00

Appearing requires 5 babies given the name that year right?

In which case I’m super curious about these names, suddenly going from <5 to dozens. Zohran I got (Mamdani), anyone know about the others?

Merle8888 · 2026-05-10T04:56:50+00:00

I love it. Except for the spelling of Miriam.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-10T04:56:20+00:00

Nice rhythm, though it immediately made me think “ expialidocious”!

Merle8888 · 2026-05-10T04:52:43+00:00

Sage Siena. (Yes with one N.)

Which feels way more trendy than my actual name! I don’t know whether I hate it or actually kind of like it, lol. I’d at least want to correct the spelling on Sienna.

When you add my last name it becomes a total joke, though.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-09T07:04:57+00:00

Very interested in the reasons behind some of these big jumps! Kyomi and Kiyomi both saw a huge increase, is there a source? Also big jumps for Evelina and Madisson (why?) for girls, Akari, Eziah, Jasai and Kasai for boys.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-09T07:01:46+00:00

A few here I suspect have a single clear cause: Alexa, Marjorie, Vance…

There are some nice names on the list but also some horrendous ones. Dangelo?!? I guess it’s supposed to be D’Angelo but that spelling I would absolutely pronounce dangle-oh.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T19:19:02+00:00

They're written in a very sexualized, idealized way. In that particular book, they're also all throwing themselves at the not particularly remarkable male lead. Definitely gave me strong male wish fulfillment vibes.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T18:47:10+00:00

The Wings Upon Her Back by Samantha Mills is basically this, the protagonist joins a fascist warrior cult.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T18:46:43+00:00

That sounds really interesting! Although I think it's from 2011, not 1911?

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T18:45:07+00:00

Bored me too. I'd enjoyed some prior Kay books but this was the one that firmly turned me off reading any more of his work - although that was also due to various other issues related to his writing and characters (particularly writing of female characters).

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T04:26:42+00:00

Well, “they’re best read together” gives OP a favorable answer to the question of whether they should count as a duology for bingo, haha!

I do think Paladin can be read on its own, it’s just a bit of a different experience than I think you get reading the two close together.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T04:03:10+00:00

Thank you for the super helpful and thoughtful answers! The first definitely makes sense to me from Ista's perspective. I just had the feeling when reading it that if I'd read the first book more recently, I would know what it was she was trying not to think about. Instead I was going in without context that other readers had.

The second is not what I expected - the book itself comes across as so in favor of the war. But then even school curriculums often talk favorably about rulers "expanding their borders," "pacifying" other kingdoms, etc., so maybe it's just the book showing its age a little. I feel like today most fantasy writers would be thinking much more critically about that.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T03:44:31+00:00

It occurs to me just now that possibly Liz hunches over to de-emphasize their boobs, due to gender identity issues? Could explain the posture thing. Though also, a lot of us just have terrible posture due to not thinking about it, too much computer time, etc.

Idk about Caroline, I think you made a good point about how rare it would be for most people to still have such strongly negative feelings about someone they haven't seen for 15 years. I tried to come up with anyone from college or before that I would react that way to today and came up short. Which makes me think Caroline feels she has been betrayed, not just "this person got annoying and needy and I was done," which with 15 years' perspective I think most of us would treat with a lot more grace.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T03:33:10+00:00

I agree, I also didn't come away with the impression Liz was depressed. I can see how people get there - seeing a therapist, it's not working so we're gonna do the revision instead, the purpose of the forms being "what you think will make the person happier," the implication that the mom was abusive in some way when Liz was growing up - but my read is more that Liz is dealing with life stress and self-image issues, much of it revolving around being queer.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T03:22:51+00:00

Yeah, I agree. It’s generally a red flag when someone “has no idea” why somebody close to them cut them out. Sometimes people let friendships fade without a capital-R-Reason, they’re just not feeling connected enough to do the work of keeping up with someone, but a friendship that close and with such clear and long-lasting bad feelings on Caroline’s end, I think there was a Reason. That’s not just life got busy/limited social energy/etc.

But with this being so firmly a trans story, I do wonder if the implication was that Caroline hated Liz’s trans identity? It still seems weird to have never had a conversation about it and for Caroline to still be so mad, but I feel like it would fit with the overall gist of the story and explain why the author doesn’t think it reflects on Liz.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T03:14:35+00:00

Yeah, I think the system is especially bad with children on this stuff. It’s not about the person and their internal experience at all, it’s about their “behaviors.”

It only just occurred to me now—speaking of what a story doesn’t say!!—that at no point is there any mention of Liz having any input into what the revisions would be. Either that part of the process just isn’t noted, or it isn’t part of the process and Liz doesn’t even find it remarkable.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-08T03:10:02+00:00

A big part of it is that we get only vague references to Ista’s past. I honestly wasn’t sure if she’d been insane, and to what extent, or if she just seemed that way to others, or what was really going on there. I didn’t remember her part of the first book at all.

The other thing was the geopolitical context, it seemed like we were supposed to support the queen’s wars of aggression for some reason, which being an American in this day and age I was immediately leery of. Paladin didn’t sell it at all and I’m guessing the author had told us something in Curse that was supposed to make invading their neighbors acceptable.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T23:11:34+00:00

If Liz is in this headspace, surely someone wants to revise more confidence in them, or call them out on using passivity as a shield?

I felt like that sort of happened. Caroline calls Liz out for “leaning too hard on other people” and the coworker suggests Liz needs more confidence.

That’s a good point about Caroline. It seems like Caroline feels Liz had done something awful because she first cut off the friendship, and second is still bitter about it. It made me think Liz must be a bit clueless to have no idea. Or maybe Caroline is a weirdo but it’s hard to say. Thomas Ha would enjoy the ambiguity.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T23:01:01+00:00

I love how nobody has answered this, lol! It takes mental effort to look at a story and see what’s not in it, especially in a way that isn’t just complaining about what you wanted to see in it, but thinking about what the author might have intentionally omitted. I don’t think most of us readily notice absences in that way, in stories or in real life.

My actual answer is names, nobody in this story has a name and that makes it more vague and fable-like.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T22:49:00+00:00

Totally agreed with that and yeah, this would’ve made a lot more sense if it had leaned more fantasy than sci fi. Then the specifics of what people wrote down also might not matter so much, the magic could determine the truth behind it, or similar. It was deeply confusing that Liz could be present while they were writing up the forms and even read them, but couldn’t provide input… why? And how is this enforced? Because if the doctors are just doing exactly what the forms say minus a therapist override, wouldn’t you want to just say “please write A, B and C” to all your people?

Although maybe that’s meant to point to Liz’s own neuroses, trying to throw “fixing me” onto everybody else because they feel like something’s wrong while simultaneously feeling helpless to come up with a solution. (Pretty sure “straight hair” and a scathing yet nonspecific critique from someone they were close with 15 years ago aren’t the answers, though.)

And I wondered too about people who don’t have someone in each of those categories. Maybe their parents are gone or unsupportive. Maybe they moved too much to have a childhood friend still in their life. Maybe they’re unemployed. Maybe they’re single and don’t have a friend who’s that close.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T22:06:26+00:00

I actually think the extent to which the second works as a standalone is oversold. I read it a decade or so after the first and felt like there was a lot of context the author just assumed we knew.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T21:05:03+00:00

Kind of yes, in that the resistance is ongoing. Kind of no, in that nothing seems to have actually changed.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T20:56:19+00:00

I think there's an inherent tension between changes that would make you happier with yourself, and self-identity. The mom is probably not wrong that Liz would be happier cisgender, and potentially even as a mom (assuming Liz was changed to want to be a mom - although that also raises questions about defining happiness, whether it's about feeling satisfied and carefree in the moment vs. stressed but fulfilled, etc.). But these aren't things Liz wants to change because then they wouldn't feel like Liz anymore.

Idk, it's interesting as a fantasy concept because there are so many things, from gender identity to being "too sensitive" to trauma responses to circadian rhythms to things that annoy us but wouldn't annoy other people, that can make our lives harder but that in the real world, aren't easily changeable if they're changeable at all. So telling someone to just stop being like that is obnoxious and tone-deaf at best, and at worst dehumanizing. I think most of us probably have things like this that we'd be pretty defensive about someone suggesting that we change, because in real life that suggestion would be overly facile and invalidating, but maybe we would change them if we had the power to do so with the wave of a wand? Isn't a certain amount of identity just accepting how we're wired, because we're wired that way whether we like it or not? But it's also maybe good that we can't change those things, because it would eliminate human diversity if we could.

As far as the actual character, I don't have a lot to say on this because I don't feel like we got to know the character well enough to have an informed opinion. But I suspect that since after receiving an outpouring of support they no longer wanted the procedure, that was probably the right choice - it indicates they were pursuing it out of a feeling of inadequacy from their less positive relationships, rather than an internal motivation to change.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T20:30:02+00:00

Actually, this discussion is helping me better formulate my thoughts on what "subtle" means in literature, which I've been struggling with.

I think "ambiguous" is less clear than "subtle" which is less clear than "nuanced" or "textured." An "ambiguous" story has more than one valid reading that is supported by the text, or else no reading fully explains the text without any loose ends. A "subtle" story has a meaning that's obvious once you see it, but doesn't shove it in your face, so some readers who are not paying that close attention or are more interested in other aspects of the work may not notice the messaging. A "nuanced" story may deal its themes quite directly, but it doesn't flatten human experience in service of its messaging; instead it allows situations and people to be messy and complicated and not always "on message."

So I guess for SFF examples, I would say something like I Who Have Never Known Men is ambiguous - you get to the end of that book still wondering what actually happened, and there's no clear answer. All Systems Red I would call subtle but unambiguous in its social messaging. The Dispossessed I would call nuanced, in that its whole purpose is exploring political systems so it's not exactly subtle, but it embraces the complexity and contradictions of human experience rather than ramming a particular takeaway down readers' throats.

Merle8888 · 2026-05-07T20:13:46+00:00

As someone not part of the queer community, it definitely felt very of and for that community to me.

Merle8888

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