Pen names, Pseudonyms, or Nom de Plumes.

Jenn McKinlay: There are probably as many reasons to have a pen name as there are pen names in use. So why do some authors write under different names?

     A quick study of famous authors and their pseudonyms reveals that Stephen King wrote under the name Richard Bachman so that he wasn’t constrained by the publishing belief at the time that an author was limited to one book per year. He also wanted to discover for himself if his success was due to talent or luck. Unfortunately, he was outed as Bachman fairly early on and never did satisfy that question to his liking, much like another famous author J.K. Rowling.

     Rowling used her initials instead of her first name Joanne, because her publisher felt that her reader demographic (tween boys) wouldn’t respond to a female author. In fact, Rowling didn’t have a middle name and had to borrow the K from her grandmother’s name Kathleen. After the success of Harry Potter, she wanted to try her hand at mysteries and wrote under the name Robert Galbraith to take the new work as far away from herself as possible. Like King, her true identity was revealed too soon for her to discover how her books would have fared had readers not discovered Galbraith’s true identity.

     Other authors have used pseudonyms to allow them to try out different genres. Dame Agatha Christie wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott. She said the mysteries were her day job but the romances were for fun! In a flip on this, romance author Nora Roberts writes futuristic police procedurals under the name J.D. Robb. Ann Rice, also used a penname when she wrote two erotic novels under the name Anne Rampling. Of course, Ann Rice is actually a nom de plume with her maiden name being Howard Allen Frances O’Brien. And then, there is Dean Koontz who is said to have as many as ten pen names, because like Stephen King, he wrote so many books that his publisher couldn’t keep up. Also, in an interview he said there was no way he could earn a livable wage writing just one book per year. Some of his names include David Axton, Richard Paige, Anthony North, and his gothic-romance pseudonym Deanna Dwyer.

     There are other reasons that authors use pen names, for me, it was because my first mystery was actually a writer for hire work. Having had FISH FOOD -- my dead strip club owner found being eaten by the fish in his saltwater tank mystery -- soundly rejected, I was willing to give it a go when a publisher asked my agent to ask me if I’d consider writing one of their in house ideas. Because while they weren’t keen on my book -- at all -- they did like my voice. Um…thanks?

     Turned out, they wanted a mystery series about decoupage. Decou-what? Yeah, whatever. Of course, I said yes! Suspecting this would be a short-lived series, I made up a pen name that consisted of my dog (Lucy) and my grandmother (Lawrence). And then an interesting thing happened, I discovered I liked writing under a pen name. It was liberating in ways I hadn’t expected so when the opportunity arose to take on another series while maintaining the two series I’d begun since the decoupage books tanked (shocker!), I took the job and wrote a bargain hunters series under the name Josie Belle (another grandmother name mash-up).

     Would I ever write under a pen name again? In a heartbeat. Truly, there was something very freeing about writing as someone else. Although, next time, I’m going to be a dude.

     How about you, Reds? Any nom de plumes in action out there? If not, what is the pen name you would write under if you had the chance?

For Fun:

 QUIZ: Match the author to the pen name 
(I scored 8 out of 10, if we’re sharing!)

Are We Ever REAL Writers?

DEB: The next few weeks we'll be celebrating "Awards Month" here on Jungle Red, with special attention to the Agathas and the Edgars. Julia Spencer-Fleming will be interviewing the Agatha Best First Novel nominees over the next two weeks, and Hallie Ephron will be filling us in on juicy tidbits from the Edgars.

AND--drum roll here!!--our very own Hank Phillipi Ryan's Drive Time is an Agatha nominee for Best Novel. I'll be talking to Hank about Drive Time this Thursday, so stay tuned.

AND--cymbals this time--this Tuesday, Jungle Red's Julia Spencer-Fleming and Rosemary Harris both have new books out, One Was a Soldier from Julia and Slugfest from Ro. I'm expecting both in my mailbox on Tuesday morning--Hope you are, too!

But with all the well-deserved acclaim accorded our authors and the other nominees this months, I've kept thinking about something Maya Angelou said a good many years ago--"Each time I write a book, every time I face that yellow pad, the challenge is so great. I have written eleven books, but each time I think, 'Uh, oh, they're going to find out now. I've run a game on everybody and they're going to find me out.'"

And I wondered--do any of us, no matter how many awards or nominations or any other kind of public acclaim we receive, ever feel like "real" writers?

I know I don't. Once upon a time I thought that once you had written "a" book, writing another would surely be easy. Ha. I have written a good few books since those naive days, and I've discovered that, in fact, it never gets easier. And while for the most part I like the books I've written, I always wonder if I'll be able to pull off the next one, or if, like Maya Angelou, I'll be "found out."

Then I realized that the only time I ever feel like a "real writer" is when I'm actually writing, when I'm in the "zone" and the words are pouring out faster than I can type them. But when that's happening, whether or not I'm a "real writer" is the last thing I think about.

So while we LOVE awards and recognition--and we hope they encourage lots and lots of people to buy our books--they don't fundamentally change our job. It's still the writer and the blank page, and as Stefanie Pintoff so aptly quoted SJ Rozan last week, Chop Wood/Carry Water.
How about you, Jungle Reds? Have awards changed how you feel about writing or about yourself as a writer?

ROBERTA/LUCY: (Trying to get used to the new name:)...Deb, you're right, awards don't do a thing when you're sitting in front of the screen or the notebook.

Although anything that boosts a writer's confidence a little helps grease the cogs, don't you think?

Writing is very hard. I find first drafts particularly so--lots of voices suggesting that the story or the way I've written it are ridiculous! I think the one thing we learn as we go along is to set the voices aside and patiently remind ourselves that it probably isn't as bad as we thought. And even if it is, it can be fixed!

I loved the chop wood/carry water reference too. SJ is such a smart lady!

JAN: It seems to me that most writers are always looking for ways to minimize their achievements, so awards and reviews help us feel legitimate. But I think the thing that helps me write best when I'm staring at the screen to is giving myself license to write poorly -- knowing full well, correcting writing is where the fun is.

RHYS: Like many writers I am completely fragile about what I'm writing. As I write each book I go through a few flashing highs of "this is brilliant" to many despairing lows of "this is rubbish. Nobody will like it. My sales will plummet and I'll never get another contract."

So I keep my awards on a shelf halfway down the stairs. I have to pass it every time I come up from my office to the kitchen for more coffee/cookies etc. And it's a great reminder and morale booster that I can write books that people like.

ROSEMARY: I do have my awards certificates framed - one is next to a plastic plug-in angel and the other is....somewhere, so they definitely mean something to me. But I have to say it was the comment of a longtime publishing executive who actually used the words "you're a real writer" that made me feel like one.

Yes, the first box of books is thrilling and passing by a shop window that has some of my titles on display is wonderful, but it was that gentleman's remark that did the trick because he had worked with so many legendary writers.

HANK: Heck yes, it matters to me. Oh, I'm too..something. My parents were always saying things like-you got an A-? How come you didn't get an A? But the wonderful outcome of that is that I try my best ALL the time, in whatever I do. And writing is the most challenging. SO to have the pats on the back from my peers, and from readers? Gee. It honestly brings tears to my eyes.

JULIA: Jan, I agree with you; giving myself permission to write crap is sometimes the only thing that frees me the paralyzing fear of...well, writing crap.

Also, like Rhys, I see-saw wildly throughout the process of completing the book - except my "nobody will like it" boogyman is "therefore, I'll have to go back to being a LAWYER!!" So no, sadly, winning or being nominated for awards does jack-all for the actual process of writing.

However, it is a sweet thing to be appreciated, whether that comes in the form of a teapot or a piece of paper or a reader who drove two hours to come to your library talk. And ultimately, I think that's what drives us, don't you? Having someone say, "I loved your story?" I mean, if there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that no one pursues a writing career for the money!

DEB: I'm with Jan and Julia on the permission to write crap. My daily motto is Nora Roberts's "Bad pages are better than no pages." It's enormously liberating to give yourself permission not to be perfect. And what's amazing is that the crap pages usually--with a good bit of work--turn out to be not so bad after all.

As for being REAL writers, I have a suspicion that writers are a bit like the Velveteen Rabbit--we only become real when we're read.

So here's to reading, and to adding many, many fabulous books to our "To Read" stacks from the next few weeks' blogs!