She's very sneaky, and you might be, too.

[mrissa]

truepenny reports that she will now be writing as Katherine Addison instead of Sarah Monette, to fool bookstore computers. (If you're still confused about this after reading her entry, ask and people here can explain.)

Which made me wonder: how many of us have a list of pen names we would use in this situation? I know I do. I skip the most obvious one, which is my actual legal name (Marissa Gritter), because I have a possibly weird personal bias about pen names, and this bias only applies to me: I am not Dutch. I don't want to use a Dutch name for my writing because I am not Dutch, not Dutch-American or Dutch-Michigander or any other thing that might tie to being Dutch. I am greatly fond of my Dutch-Michigander husband and in-laws and those of their Dutch-Michigander friends and associates I have met, but if it is true as they say in Grand Rapids that if y'ain't Dutch, y'ain't much, I am, in fact, not much. But I would write as a Fossback, because that was my Gran's name, or as a Haugan, because it would amuse me to go incognito as Ms. Norwegian Underhill, or as a few other things that are both ethnically appropriate to me and reasonably spellable.

(As I said, this does not apply to you lot. If you are Italian-American and you write as Julio Nguyen-Markowicz, I would not be the least put off by that. But the only exception for me personally that we've joked about is that if I start writing teen romance novels, I would do so as Melissa Glitter. The likelihood of this is well into the negative numbers--I can imagine writing in a lot of genres and categories, but none of them are romance.)

So. Do you know who you'd be to fool bookstore computers? And do you have a rationale? ("I like that name" is a rationale.)

Comments

[rosefox]

Not bookstore computers, but if I decided to write down some of the truly creepy horror that occasionally shows up in my head, I'd do it as William Jacobs (after Jakob and Wilhem Grimm).

[stillnotbored.livejournal.com]

My grandmother's birth name is at the top of the list, Lorene Hampton. I could write under my mother's birth name, Van Buren, or my great-grandmother's birth name of Russell.

I have an entire list of family names I'd be happy to pull from. Lots of kick ass women in my family with great names I could use.

And someday! I will learn to type.

[nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com]

I'd probably go with Fradelos or Tsarnas. Of course, I already don't care about bookstore computers anyway, so it hardly matters.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I have two. One would be Jo Alton, which would put me at the good old start of the alphabet, make me related to the Altons of Darkover, and be easy for my friends to find. The other would be Jo Quentin, because it starts with a Q, and I don't have anybody on my bookshelves who starts with a Q and of Q names, Quentin is the most plausible. Nether of these names reflects my ethnicity, but gosh I'd have to go back aways to get to a name that does.

I'm really fortunate this hasn't happened to me yet.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I'm going to be keeping an eye on the front of the alphabet now. I expect it'll grow disproportionately, to the point where some of it will be at the bottom of some shelves :-).

[columbina.livejournal.com]

I have four names. I decided years ago that if I were to write children's books I would lop off the first one and the last one and get a perfectly acceptable pen name, since the name I actually use (the 3rd) works just as well as a surname as a given name.

I would prefer not to use a pseudonym at all - I like getting credit for my work. But there are reasons why it might have to be, and one of them is that the children's book industry would shy from a writer whose (admittedly obscure) past credits consist mostly of writing erotic stories or articles for sex-oriented magazines/websites.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yah, separating out marketing is a different reason from bookstores not wanting books by an author at all.

[poeticalpanther.livejournal.com]

I already do use a pseudonym for my writing, or rather will be when next I am published, mostly because I am a private person, and on the rare chance that my books become Terribly Famous, I won't have to be except when I want to be. Or that's the thinking, anyway.

I use my middle name and my grandmother's maiden name, because I like the matriarchal element of the latter, and because my middle name was adopted in admiration of someone who helped me a great deal when I became me, as opposed to that bloke people once thought I might be.

Trying on identities as if they were swimsuits at L. L. Bean

[shalanna.livejournal.com]

I have so many pen names already!

Shalanna Collins is actually a pen name of sorts. When I first discovered dial-up BBS living back around 1982 (~!~), the BBS sysops told you not to use your real name but to use a handle or pen name, because they'd had problems in the past with people getting their phone numbers and addresses looked up in the phone book (remember I said it was ancient times~!) and then getting hassled IF their BBS posts had rankled these other people. At the time, it was mostly a local hobbyist thing.

So I took "Sheila" and "Lana," two family names out of our family tree, and made "Shalanna," which my mother approved of. "Collins" is also a family last name (we're 75% Irish, she says, even though I don't think you can be 75% Irish *and* 15% Choctaw *and* all those other percentages she believes we are.) I soon was running my own BBS, White Pegasus (later Palindrome WriterNet), and it was a good thing that they didn't know "who I was IRL," for many of the guys thought it was outrageous to have a sysop-ette (a GIRRRLLL), and they liked to hassle me. Whew! Have things changed? Yes, I would say sort of they HAVE.

Anyhow. So that became my pen name for SF/F and essays.

About five years ago, an agent told me that neither my "real" name or Shalanna would be good for book covers, and that if my mystery series sold, she'd like me to use a pre-approved, crowd tested name. It happened that another writer friend's agent had actually offered her a list of names that went through a focus group (!!!) and had been officially approved (!!!!). She only needed one. So she offered me the list, and I chose "Caitlyn Young." That's what I've used on my romantic suspense/paranormal romance over at TextNovel/Dorchester. I think it sounds like a romantic young writer.

I believe Shalanna is now too easily Googleable with all sorts of opinions and hobby talk--and now there's a famous singer with my "real" name--so it could be that I'll have need of yet another pen name. This time I'd throw caution to the winds and do some kind of literary allusion or pun. Holly Golightly is probably TOO obvious. Fewer people would "get" Elizabeth Darcy (nee Bennet), but there you are. There might be others. . . .

My cousin decided to be very Southern-helpless-trailer about it and registered on TextNovel as "Alyncia DuBois." I had to laugh, as Alyncia is the name of my heroine out of my first non-juvenilia fantasy novel ("Paladin Spellbound," currently under the bed in a box), and DuBois is a nod to Blanche DuBois, who was the nut in "Streetcar Named Desire." She really got into it with them over on the forums, I am told, so I'm glad she didn't register as herself! Her "real" name is passably weird, anyway.

Alyncia DuBois should write a grotesquerie Southern Gothic sort of thing. Unfortunately, my cousin is into realistic YA stuff instead. . . .

Re: Trying on identities as if they were swimsuits at L. L. Bean

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I'm rather appalled by the notion of a focus-group tested list of pen names.

Actually, scratch the "rather." I'm just appalled.

[carbonel]

The pseudonym I use for writing and publishing fan fiction is a contraction of my middle name and my mother's maiden name: Jan Levine.

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

(So then when you go to cons, if you go to cons, do people call you "Jan" or do they call you whatever non-fandom people call you?)

[starlady38.livejournal.com]

If I ever do wind up publishing fiction I'd almost certainly have to do it under a pen name, which would probably be my mother's maiden name and either a nickname or my middle name (hey, maybe I could actually use my Confirmation name! that'd be cool). I wouldn't want any fiction credits to detract from my academic reception, or vice versa. And if I needed a new pen name, there are other names that women in my family have had to discard.

Which does solve the ethnicity question; I wouldn't want to give a hugely mistaken impression.

[kalmn.livejournal.com]

see, i never think about this.

however, i do think about what if i had to disappear and go into hiding, which name would i use then?

your differently weird friend,
me

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Okay, that makes sense.

But come on, tell us the names, that's the point of this thread! Tell us the secret names you're going to hide from us under!

Oh. Uh, never mind.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

I have always wanted to use the name Wendell. And I have always been fond of author names with an inordinate number of initials (e.g., E. T. A. Hoffman). I might try on E. T. A. Wendell for size.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

ETA to me means Edited To Add. But you could edit things to add Wendell, if you wanted, as long as they were your things to edit.

[jenett]

The writing I've done is as Jenett Silver, which is not my legal name by a long stretch :)

The legal name would be manageable, though people try to mangle my last name into sounding French (to which my response is usually "Pronounce both ts - it hasn't been French since the Norman Conquest").

My legal name also suffers from a problematic R placement for me, due to the last residual bits of very specific hearing loss when I was learning to talk. (R and W remain hard letters for me: one of my voice teachers in college finally figured out that I don't actually hear myself say the letter R as much as know where it really ought to be.) Saying my name is usually fine, but spelling it can be tricky if I'm having a bad day.

I've long been tempted by using Penelope (what my parents almost named me) as some portion of a pen name. (Either as the first name, or using Pen or something similar as a surname). My middle name (Clare) is also a perfectly serviceable last name.

(In my junior high, there was someone named Jennifer Clare who kept getting called down to the office, and I kept having that reaction you do when your parent starts using your full name and you know you're in trouble for something and then going "Oh, right, not me.")

[wshaffer.livejournal.com]

For first names, I'd mostly likely take Gwendolyn (my father's nickname for me), or Gwen, or Anne (my middle name). Just because they are names that are sort of mine, and so it wouldn't be totally weird to hear myself referred to by them.

For last names, taking my husband's last name, Starr, seems like a really obvious choice, because it's memorable and easy to spell. And Gwendolyn Starr has a certain ring to it. I do rather love my grandfather's last name, Desnoyers, and Anne Desnoyers is a very plausible name, but no one would ever be able to spell/pronounce it correctly.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My grandmother also nicknames people by lengthening their names, sometimes. It amuses me.

[eposia.livejournal.com]

My first author name was "C.M. Brown" which is just another form of my actual name, so I'd probably resurrect that one. I don't have many usable family surnames, though probably the most entertaining one on my mother's side is "Boring" (yes, really) which might work for novelty's sake, especially if I were writing kid's books, but more likely wouldn't. There's also "Dye", which sounds so innately hillbilly to my inner ear that I suspect I shouldn't use that one.

So once I ran through Reesa Brown and C.M., I'd probably have to start getting more creative.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Me, I have been there and done that already, in exactly the same circumstances as Sarah: Ace dumped me, the bookstores all looked askance at the notion of any further Chaz Brenchley books, and so I went to Del Rey and became moshui.

Why moshui Daniel Fox? I honestly can't remember. It's a name I'd used before, back when I was a crime writer and there was a conspiracy abroad to make me write horror in my copious spare time; I published a few stories as Daniel Fox, and was working on a novel when the whole project became moot because my crime publisher started publishing my crime books as horror anyway and Dreadful Confusion threatened. But I really can't remember why I chose that name, or if indeed there was any reason other than that I find it euphonious and it's much easier to remember and spell than Chaz Brenchley ever was...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

And the "friend Daniel" comments make for good Asimov reference jokes.

[jmeadows.livejournal.com]

I've only wanted to use my legal name, Jodi Meadows. I've considered Marie Meadows (middle name) because I like the alliteration, as well as my maiden name, Jodi Lawrence. (Which I seem to have lost the ability to spell the first time 'round.) And while I don't think either of those are bad...I really like my married name. Ideally, I'll never have to use anything else. :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I like that.

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

P.S. MELISSA GLITTER totally FTW.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Katherine was my maternal grandmother's first name (which she didn't use--she always went by her middle name), and Addison was my paternal grandfather's middle name. So it was a way to commemorate both sides of the family, and two of the three grandparents I have no memory of. (Both grandfathers died before I was born, and my maternal grandmother was afflicted with Alzheimer's when I was still very young; there are photographs to say I met her, but I don't remember her at all.) I thought about doing it the other way (paternal grandmother's and maternal grandfather's middle names), but (a.) that produced Maud Bunyan, which I find not terribly felicitous, and (b.) I would feel weird publishing under my paternal grandmother's name when I did know her and I know she didn't like fantasy. My Grandma Shirley, on the other hand, gave me the copy of The Hobbit I still own, so I feel like her auspices are benevolent.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My mormor doesn't use her first name, either, so I could be Joanne without any confusion, except that I think I am not a Joanne and could not successfully feign being one in print.

I am fond of the name Maud Bunyan, but not for you or anything you seem likely to write.

Hmm, howsabout ...

[freelikebeer.livejournal.com]

Margrit Fossback.

Re: Hmm, howsabout ...

[freelikebeer.livejournal.com]

Mary Ritter, Mary Rissater, Timothy Cooper :), Antimony Grooper, Per Lingen, Linganore Martissa, ...

[tournevis.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm my real full name, with hyphenated first name and all, for my non-fiction, and I'm my initials, non hyphen and real last name for fiction. So far, that's all I've needed to fool anyone.

[tournevis.livejournal.com]

Now, who I'd want to be is Jean-Christophe Janson.

[pameladean]

I live in fear of having to do this and it would really make me angry.

That said, I'd use Collins, which is my original middle name and an old family name, and with it one of the names my mother thought of calling me but didn't: Meredith, Camilla, or Kimberly. I'd have to decide whether alliteration was unfortunate or not.

P.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Your mother thought of calling you Meredith?

I can only comfort myself with the idea that she had not read your books at the time.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure all my friends would want me to use my real first name if I had to reboot, just to end the confusion of "but what should I call you at cons?" But I don't think I want to. It gets messed up too often, and doesn't sound good with any of the last names I've pondered.

My front-running possibility, however, got a hole knocked in it when I discovered I've been misspelling my maternal grandmother's maiden name all this time. I thought it was Seline, and so the name was Anna Seline -- my mother's middle name is Anne, but the rhythm goes better with the a -- but it turns out it's spelled Sellin, and then it looks too much like "selling," which is just distracting. So I don't know what I'd do.

Sadly, I'm not a huge fan of most of the maiden names buried in my family tree. Though Balmer would at least put me back near the front of the alphabet.

Edited to correct an error, and also to say -- I DO NOT WANT to have to change names, of course. Not just because of what it would mean professionally, but because Writer-Me has been Marie Brennan since I was ten years old, and so I am what you might call attached to that name.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That's quite some time to get attached, yes. Were you thinking of it in terms of making people spell your legal name when you were 10? or was it an "everybody has a pen name and this will be mine" 10-year-old thought process? Or something else?

[elsue.livejournal.com]

Don't know whether I'd really do it, but years ago I decided on "Lesley Winter", or "Less Winter" for short. (I get tired of winter pretty quickly, and I'm not even all that far north.)

[zunger.livejournal.com]

I suspect that if I were to ever try to publish something which didn't belong on very technical bookshelves, where people are already used to seeing unpronounceable names, that I would need to pick some sort of pen name. And probably one further from the end of the alphabet, because otherwise I would be filed next to the anthologies and at the bottom of the shelf and nobody would ever look that far except if they overshot Roger Zelazny by accident.

Which makes me kind of glad that I'm not likely to try and publish any such things, because I have no idea what name I would use. I'm rather attached to my own, and never really wanted to change it... even though I've even had girlfriends unable to pronounce and/or spell it correctly. (The girlfriends did not last long, although not specifically for that reason)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I think inability to spell and/or pronounce one's name is ample reason for breakup all by itself.