Pseudonyms - yes or no?

Re JK Rowling, I'd always assumed there was a perceived bias in that boys aged 10-14 wouldn't read a book -- or the publishers thought they wouldn't -- obviously written by a woman. I've never bothered doing any research into the sex of authors for that age group, though - so this could simply be my own sexism coming into play.

I'm another one looking at a pseudonym, not so much for secrecy, though there is an element of that, but simply because my name is so stultifyingly boring, no one would ever pick up a novel with my monicker on it.
 
It's not that bad!
 
im basing my accusation on the fact that walk into a bookstore and look at the shelves.. 60% is male.. now look on the sff aisle.. at least 80% are male..

yes there's succesful female writers, but men tend to get further ahead.. and yes it is true that the published wanted J.K. instead of her name, as it sound more masculine..

so i'll stick by a male pseudonym.. unless a publisher tells me not to
 
Darksaber said:
im basing my accusation on the fact that walk into a bookstore and look at the shelves.. 60% is male.. now look on the sff aisle.. at least 80% are male..
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That may be true where you live, but you can't go by what you see in your local bookstores. You have look beyond that, and at actual publishing figures if you can. What is on the shelves can be deceptive. The real question is which books sell and have to be reordered and restocked. And Ireland is a very small market. To be successful, you would want your books to be exported elsewhere. As I said, give some thought to exactly what kind of SFF you are writing. It makes a difference. There is a growing market for SF and fantasy aimed specifically at women. Your research has to go further than a glance at the bookshelves.

As for Rowling, if her publishers said that they wanted a more masculine name, then they were obviously aiming for a niche market of little boys. Clearly they were wrong about that. By the time her books were an international success, everyone knew she was a woman.

A very large proportion of YA fiction is bought for children by librarians, teachers in the lower grades, and parents. In the US, teachers and librarians are still overwhelmingly female.
 
not just ireland.. ive been in bookstores in London, Cardiff, New York and have seen similar.. and if you go by book sales and restocking.. i can always find McCaffrey and Rice, but never Feist, Brooks, Goodkind or Pratchett, hell even Paolini is in low demand..

look i dont want this to turn into a sexism debate.. i merely stated that from my own personal findings, and that of my friends.. 65-70% of sff books on the shelves are male authors..
 
Every editor that I have ever spoken to says you can't go by what you see on the shelves (for one thing, what you see there represents what publishers were buying at least 18-24 months ago, not what they are looking for now, and what the trends are for the future), and I have been watching the rise of imprints like Luna, and spoken with authors and editors about the efforts their publishers are making to grab more of that very profitable market of female readers. But of course it is your decision to make, and you can make it on any evidence you choose.

However, unless you have a book ready to be published, you still have plenty of time to gather information from people in the industry, so my advice is to take your time over that decision. It will be an important one.

I wasn't, by the way, arguing with you about sexism. I've been trying to share what I know about trends in the publishing industry. That's two different topics.
 
I say real name. As I am proud of my name and I'm not shy at all to reveal the person that I am behind my work. People may love or hate what you're writing, but always stand up being proud of your real name.

Well, that's just my opinion.
 
I thiink 'JK Rowling' is more snappy than 'Joanne Rowling', but that's just me. I have no idea why she choose it, but that'd have been my reason.

For years I always thought I'd go with a pen name, but nowadays I'm pretty sure I'd stick with my real name, either with a pair of initials, or first name, initial, last name. It would put me solidly in the middle of the shelves, near such luminaries as Hobb, Heinlein and our very own Howard.

That's providing, of course, that I ever actually finish anything of publishable standard. Not a lot of point musing about it at this early juncture.
 
Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but pretty much my entire life people have called me by the wrong name when they read it, be it teachers, employers, telemarketers, or arresting officers. Every man in my family has three first names for a full name, and almost half the time, someone calls my by my surname (George) thinking it's my given name.

I've thought long and hard about rolling with a pseudonym, and have decided that I'd much rather bury my ego and not use my real name to cut down on confusion.
 
The JK Rowling thing is kind of odd, as I seem to recall the biggest story around the release and success of the first HP novel was that Rowling was a single mother and she wrote most of the book in a cafe, all presented as a sort of rags-to-riches heartwarming tale designed to fill in five minutes of a slow news day.

Also, with all due respect to the above discussion re: success of female authors, next time someone goes into a bookshop and finds their eyes tearing up over the mysogynistic domination of the Fantasy/Sci-Fi shelves, I reccommend they turn around and look at the colossal wall of "paranormal romance" that's probably facing it. Teresa is right; you have to look at a much, much bigger picture before you can start drawing such broad conclusions.

I still say it's best to either stick with your own name, or plan ahead for getting found out.
 
Well, if the pseudonym is designed more to create easier "brand recognition," I don't think I'd have to prepare much for "getting found out"

I'm not hiding so much as tired of being called by surname. Anyone that "finds out" is likely smart enough to be capable of addressing me properly.
 
Xelah said:
I've thought long and hard about rolling with a pseudonym, and have decided that I'd much rather bury my ego and not use my real name to cut down on confusion.
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I can't see where the confusion would lay. I never saw (as an example) author Mark Anthony's name on a book and mistakenly thought the second name right there in print was his first. Nor would I ever have the opportunity to confuse it upon meeting him in person - which would go for the majority of his readership, I am sure.
 
I can make this a boring math-read with all the numbers I looked up to make these statistics, but you're nearly five times as likely to be named Mark/Marc Anthony/Anthoney/Antony/Antoni/Antonie than have my name combination, but only about twice as likely if you switch my first and last names.

I'd just rather save myself the headache and have people call me Bob Washington (not my intended pseudonym btw)
 
Teresa Edgerton said:
-- and I have to say that overall it is such a pain and inconvenience, I would not advise anyone to do it unless there were truly compelling reasons for doing so.
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May I ask, how exactly is it a pain? I'm not talking about the examples given above about people 'finding out' your real identity; I have no problem with that. If I were to write a novel, I would probably choose to do so under a pseudonym simply because I feel my name is probably too ethnic (I'm a Pakistani Muslim) to be appealing to the majority of Fantasy readers. In that scenario, I'm not going to bother hiding my identity and would freely tell people I know that I'm the real Johnny Comelately.

So are you saying that the pen name thing is problematic only for people who wish their real name to be a secret, or is it problematic for any one, for example, yourself? In what ways has publishing under Madeline Howard been more problematic for you than Teresa Edgerton? (I'm not asking you why you changed the name; it's pretty clear you would rather not talk about it, which is fine. I'm just curious as to the inconvenience caused as a result of the change.)

P.S. - Regarding J. K. Rowling, here's an excerpt from her Wikipedia page:

"Her publisher Bloomsbury feared that the target audience of young boys might be reluctant to buy books written by a female author, and requested that she use two initials, rather than reveal her first name. As she had no middle name, she chose K as the second initial of her pseudonym, from her paternal grandmother Kathleen; it has never been part of her legal name."
 
I'd be inclined to go by a pseudonym, but that might be because I write in a narrative voice which is actually very unlike my real voice. Writers using the device of the intrusive narrator effectively make the narrator a character in their own right, so I think it makes sense for the narrator's name to appear on the front of the book.

If you have an uncommon name, I'd be inclined to use a pseudonym as one line of personal defence in the event of global success (you might as well plan big, after all...). In our celebrity-obsessed culture, there may be a few prurient fruit-loops keen to track you down. You'd only need one to seriously rain on your parade. Some sort of anonymity is not a bad thing, especially as most Really Famous Authors do not seem to earn enough to do the alternative - buy an enormous gated mansion in the Hollywood Hills and employ knuckle-dragging lackeys to keep the proles and mentalists at bay.

Finally, most of us don't have groovy names. A book is sold as a package, with cover art, title and placing on the shelves all playing a part. I'm sure the author's (apparent) name is important in this. If you're buying erotica, I can't imagine that you'd pass by the latest offering from Titania Sizzlescuttle in order to reach for the first erotic novel of Dennis Thistlethwaite. And who would read a hardcore police procedure gorefest written by Faye Drippy when Mike Clawhammer has just churned out a sequel?

Regards,

Peter
 
I actually thought I'd go with my great-great-great-grandfather's name - he was the last published writer in our family, and was a contemporary of Dickens! How does 'Jeff Marryat' sound? (Captain Marryat of 'Children of The New Forest' fame).

Is the name different enough to attract people to pick the book up, and wonder at the spelling? Could I get sponsorship from Marriott Hotels? Does it make any difference at all? Actually, I don't think so... But if it got 2 more books sold, and the publicity helped sell books, then I'll go with it. I'll see what my publisher says. When I get one.

If your name is John Smith, then I can sort of understand a pseudonym, but JP Smith doesn't sound so bad. I have a friend named Geoffrey Archer, but luckily he's not into writing...
 
Devil's Advocate said:
So are you saying that the pen name thing is problematic only for people who wish their real name to be a secret, or is it problematic for any one, for example, yourself? In what ways has publishing under Madeline Howard been more problematic for you than Teresa Edgerton?
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But I was forced, for over a year, to keep the duo-identity secret. So for me it was a problem in all the ways that I mentioned, and more, because of personal reasons particular to myself. Even since I "came out" (as you might say), it still adds an unnecessary level of complexity. And since most people's lives are complicated enough these days, I think that anyone who considers taking on a pseudonym should think about it carefully before deciding whether it is more likely to complicate or to simplify -- and also be sure that fears about using their own name are truly valid.

Darksaber's statistics are sheer nonsense, by the way, and mygoditsraining is right about the paranormal romance. DS turns out to be an alias for someone who likes to turn up here from time to time under different identities and annoy the moderators -- so not a trustworthy source of information.

Potential problems with another career obviously need to be decided on a case-by-case basis, but I think that anyone who is considering such a change should talk with people who have already done so for similar reasons, to find out whether, in retrospect, it was really worth it. Many will probably say that it was, but those might not be the ones whose situation most closely matches yours.

The same with worrying about the sound of your name, and whether or not people are likely to misread it. (In my experience, no name is safe from this.)

And I am not reluctant to talk about why I am using a pseudonym, it's just that it is a long story that I've told many times before. You can, in fact, read all about it in this thread http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/9817-concerning-pseudonyms-and-other-publishing-perils.html
 
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