The whole AngusTroll (and that second part appears to be the operative description of said individual) discussion has got me thinking: it must be a challenging decision whether to publish under your own name. Not only do you have to consider the “sale-ability” of your name, but you also have to weigh other factors, like whether there’s a lot of company in your letter of the alphabet on the shelves at Barnes & Noble. I think I read somewhere that Julia Quinn chose her pen name for that reason – not too much traffic in the “Q” section.
But then, you also have to think about your own potential fame: if your book is kick ass (and if you write, and you read this site, then I bet your book is indeed kickass) and it sells well, do you want the fame attached to your real name, and possibly end up with middle school ex-boyfriends contacting you via your author page? Or perhaps have people misrepresenting themselves as you, based on the availability of information available online that is connected to, again, your real name?
So how do you decide to pick a pen name? Why do you pick one? And what name to choose? On top of naming your characters, titling your manuscript and WRITING the damn thing, is this one more worry that seems goofy to be concerned about in the beginning? Or do you have to sit down and seriously consider your author’s identity as well?
My father is a fundamentalist minister. I went with a pen name partially to keep him from suffering any backlash from my writing, and also because my true first name is mispronounced 85% of the time, and I didn’t want my ex’s last name on my books. Now the new husband wishes I wrote as me, but I like being anonymous.
I never thought of using my second pet/second street in a combination before, so when I saw Jami’s above I felt I must share my porn star name: Duke Steele. Strong enough for a man, though made for a woman!
I went with a pen name just for my kids’ sake. They do not need the backlash heaped on top of the other pressures of growing up. It’s taken me a while to get accustomed Alessia Brio, but I’m comfortable with it/her now. I chose the name based on its meaning & association with one branch of my ancestry (Italian). It’s much girly-girlier than I, but it fits the romance genre.
Good grief, y’all, check out Alison Kent’s web page (above) and her new Blaze. GOES DOWN EASY. That has got to be the best Harlequin title ever!!! Did you come up with this one, Alison? I need this book. Backlash indeed!
This is such an interesting subject. I just blogged about it in my “Five Minutes to Choose an Alias†post and got some really fascinating answers. It was all so interesting that I followed up with a writing exercise for generating character names (or pseudonyms) three different ways—my current post. It’s a lot of fun, so please feel free to pop over and participate.
Later, I’ll be gathering all the information from the comments to both of these posts and putting it all into a separate one that includes links to each commenter’s blog.
I use a pseudonym because my real last name is hard to spell, pronounce and remember—not the best idea for the cover of a romance novel! Daisy is my grandmother’s first name, Dexter comes from Cary Grant’s character CK Dexter Haven in Philadelphia story, and Dobbs is a shortened version of my maiden name. I’ve been Daisy for so many years that the name is as much a part of me now as my real name.
Did you come up with this one, Alison? I need this book.
I did, Jennifer, but not without a lot of help from my dh brainstormer! Glad you like it!
And on the pseudonym issue again, I chose the last name of Kent because it was my younger brother’s name, and he was killed in a helicopter accident in 1987. The Alison came out of a book of baby names that said it sounded intelligent, bwahahahaha!
It is the best book you will read all year. I know. I wrote it. It is better than Bridget Jones Diary, laugh-out-loud-funny and if that ain’t enough, there’s even a nice fat vibrator in it.
Now that’s a great deal, Erin! A book and a vibrator for $10?? Are the batteries included?
I’d have to go with a pen-name because my first name is so ridiculously spelled. My name is Caryle, but pronounced Carol. (Darn you, Dad, for that stinking silent “e”)
Anyway… my porn star name is just a bit ridiculous: Poochie Havendale, so that probably won’t work.
My movie star name (middle name and mother’s maiden name) is: Renee Monroe. It’s a nice combination, but I’ve seen at least two other Monroes that write romance.
Maybe Renee Havendale? *shrug* … might work.
Who knows, ladies, you might see a book from Renee Havendale sometime. If I ever get around writing…
Caryle
This was a biggie for me. Actually I wanted Robin Owens but the website had been snatched up (I now own it, too, but tried and tried to get it). I’ve been worried about Robin D. Owens because I’ve used my middle initial for years in my signature (I’m thinking of becoming someone else)…and there is the identity theft issue.
I am a maiden (**snicker**) so no married name and I wouldn’t use any of my ex SOs (SOBs? nah, a couple weren’t bad).
I wanted Rowen Powers. My family laughed. Passing your first book contract around the dinner table (so Mom knows that you weren’t lying for the last eight years when you ducked out of family stuff saying you were going to write), and having your family LAUGH, oh, the trauma.
I have a couple of names waiting in the wings, and no, because I’m a scorpio, I won’t tell you.
However, my porn name would be Amber Beach, which is, of course, a book by Elizabeth Lowell (and I happen to live on Lowell). But the nearest cross street is Moncrief. I kid you not. Amber Moncrief. Could you ask for anything more?
Robin (who is now very worried)
The Blazes always have clever little titles, but I agree that GOES DOWN EASY has a whole lotta sass.
Good one Alison.
I chose my pen name simply because my own last name sounds too hard for romance (it’s a VERY Italian name). I went with my own first name, just dropped one ‘e’ and chose my zodiac sign. Leo. So that’ show I came up with Rene Lyons.
I have to admit, I’m not so hot for the idea of a pen name. Not necessarily because I want to impress my exes (one ex in particular, it’d probably be better if he never found any book I wrote, ahem) or the people who pissed on me in school, but I don’t want to have to remember who I am at this point in time, answer to “Jane Doe” in public, etc. Sounds like a pain to me, especially if the pen name is the one that becomes massively famous.
And besides that, I can’t think of any that would be interesting anyway. (That pet + street name thing doesn’t work when you named your pets strange things. Or only had boy pets.) I also actually LIKE my last name and hate all of the family last names but that one, and the idea of not being allowed to use it irritates me.
Oh well, it’s not like I’m even close to having a writing career at this point in time to need to worry about it yet.
My married name is hard to pronounce, easily mocked, and rather distinctive, plus my husband has a large professional practice in a small town. A smut-writing wifey isn’t the best accessory.
My maiden name I’m saving for when I write something my mother can show her church group. I’m dead serious. She’s been as supportive as she knows how to be, given that she wouldn’t touch my books with a ten-foot-altar-candle-snuffer, and I owe her that much.
I chose Selah March as my smut-writing handle because March is my birth month, and Selah is a classic Puritan name, and I’m perverse that way.
I’ve picked a pen name for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that my last name is easy for people to misspell or mispronounce.
I gave the pen name considerable thought and went with one I liked the sound of.
I’m considering this question from a marketing point of view, as the novel I’m about to launch upon the world is a gay romance novel. I’m thinking something gender-neutral would be best, as what little there is in the genre is written by men (or at least women publishing under men’s names).
My porn name is Princess Summerleaf, which sounds more like a character than an author.
My porn star name is Sprite Fredana, which just doesn’t make any sense. (Is Patty Fredana any better? Butternut Fredana? It just gets worse.)
And I can’t do the Middle Name + Mother’s Maiden name, because I’m named for my mother, which means I’d end up writing as her. Not good.
(Verification word is own71—I think that’s a hint to stick with my own name. Too late.)
I looked at all the names in my family tree. Now I have a number of pen names. I stick with Jaye Patrick because I think it works. Jaye is the first initial of my real name and Patrick is my grandfather’s first name. I don’t think Mahala, or Piety Piety, or Martha, works as well
if i were to actually get around to writing anything i think i’d use my online name. i don’t think i’ve ever used my real name online and it’s frightfully plain. besides, i like Aimey Zailia Antillies its silly and my second character i ever came up with.
and porn name: Penny Bicroft, just doesn’t really do anything for me. its kinda boring.
I think for the purposes of fame, it’s not that big a worry. The fact is, even if you hit it big, you’re really well-known only within certain circles. Unless you’re Stephen King or your mug’s been on Oprah, the general public won’t know you or care much. Writers don’t get movie star fame. Thank God.
That said, I went with my maiden name. For one, it’s the name I had when I first had dreams of writing for a living, so seeing that name on a book kinda fulfills that dream. Also, my married name? Not the sort of thing you want to launch on an unsuspecting public. Lani is hard enough to pronounce on its own; couple it with a German moniker big on the consonants and stingy with the vowels, and it’s just too much of a headache. I don’t want to make it any harder for readers to find me than it already is.
Plus, I like keeping my personal and professional separate. If I ever do hit it big enough that people start to know the name, then it’s automatically separate from the kids.
Also, I can’t pretend to be someone I’m not. God help me if I ever write under another name. I flirted with the idea at first, and at the suggestion of another author, I signed up for some loops under the pseudonym. It was a disaster. I kept signing “Lani” to every post. As it is, I never know what to sign on anything; throw a name in there that’s not even mine, and my feeble brain would pitch a fit and quit.
I’m using my real name on my book. None of the pseudonyms I came up with sounded even remotely plausible (though I don’t think I ever got into “Beige Racy” territory!) and besides, it’s my book, and part of the marketing angle is that I’m writing something familiar. It would be weird to say that if I’m pretending to be soemone else.
I find it interesting that a lot of the people here who want pseudonyms want it for a degree of secrecy. I know plenty of people who write under pseudonyms, and very very few who don’t tell their family and friends what it is they’re writing. You need those people to recruit for signings and stuff (like Diana Hunter said). Furthermore, the people who would mostly likely disapprove are probably the ones who wouldn’t be scouring the romance shelves.
I will take a pseudonym is a publisher requests it or if I’m writing in a different genre. I believe in branding your name.
The reason why I chose to pursue publication under a psuedonym is because I have built up my real name in my day profession and am somewhat well-known now. My colleagues in my day profession are expert searchers who would easily find out what I write were I to publish under my real name. I’m writing erotic romance and erotica. I’m not that keen on having what I choose to write bite me in the ass when job hunting. I am proud of what I write and chose a name that has great meaning for me. Like Indiana Jones, I’m named after the dog. I’m also used to answering to the name as it’s so close to my real name that my mom would mix us up. My “fake” last name is a family name, and the women from that line of the family have always been ahead of their time. The other reason I chose these two names is because I have this little thing for names with two syllables. In regards to myself, names with with a differing amount of syllables just sound weird.
When I got married, I decided to hyphenate. One of my co-workers said, “Jeri Smith-Ready? That sounds like an author’s name.” I thought, hmm, actually I hyphenated because I didn’t want to sound like a hair care products manufacturer, but writing books? That might be fun.
If I ever take a pen name, it’ll be my grandmother’s name, Nita O’Donnell. I think she would have liked it, especially if it were for a spicy book.
So glad to hear about the “J” phenomenon, Sonja. (And what the hell’s wrong with people who can’t pronounce Sonja?)
I would (er… really hope to!) publish under a penname. Not only do I write erotica, I write gay erotica, and I don’t particularly want homophobic loonies sending me hate mail and death threats. And, unfortunately, homophobic loonies can be found in my extended family, and I would be devastated if my *parents* got hate mail from their rabid relatives.
Meanwhile, on a tangent, when I was growing up, two of my friends’ mothers’ wrote romance novels together (“Janet Joyce”—a combination of their first names) and all the heroines in their books were named after the daughters and their friends (including me, although I had to share my spotlight with Kathy S. and Katie C. as all 3 of us were Katherines!)
I have nothing to publish, so this is a moot point, but I just wanted to add that according to the accepted formula, my “pornstar name” is…
POLLY HENTHORN.
Um, sounds a bit more like a Dickensian chamber maid than a smoldering tartlet.
“Cor blimey! Fancy a little slap and tickle before I serve the gruel, sir?”