If you are established, or at least have a following of readers, I recommend continuing with the original name. There may be branding considerations as well. If you're going through a traditional publisher, I suspect they'll want you to keep using the same name as well (and in some cases, traditional publishers even suggest pseudonyms or modifications of your name in the first place).
I'm going with a pen name - My real name is pretty but it sounds like a marriage between two romance authors ( great if that was the route I was taking but not so hot because most of my stuff is weird fiction people might take one look at my name and make assumptions ) - plus I googled my name and some authors already nabbed it as a sexy vampire hunter in a series!.... I'm actually considering using a guys name.
I've considered using a pen name, even have one picked out based on my name that I REALLY like. Will likely talk it over with my agent if I ever get one.
I'm not wild about the idea of a pen name - unless, of course, the genre isn't compatible with the day job. Because you'll be marketing so much, it seems like it would be easier to use your real name for promotion, building up your following online/social media, etc. That's just my personal preference, though - I guess I wouldn't want to have to manage to different sets of profiles once I got up and running (being the luddite I am )
Odd that you say that. Many of my favorite fantasy writers are women. In fact, some of them I completely forget until I look at the cover, because many have male MCs that are written so well. In addition, I may or may not use a pen name. If I did, it'd be E.M.K. It's a general fiction story I wrote, and I really enjoyed the MC, and those are her initials. Either that, or Richard Castle....
When I dabbled in erotic writing, I used a pen name. If I try that again, I'll continue to do so. Otherwise, I think my real name sounds okay. I have a hard enough time trying to name my characters properly, haha.
in my old life, i used a pen name for my x-rated short stories and for novels that i didn't want to be immediately pegged as having been written by a woman... all of my other writings were under my own name... since i left that old life behind, i've been living and writing as 'maia' [which i feel is my 'real' name], though i'm still forced by societal convention to use my old legal one for travelling and banking purposes...
I think I would use a pen name just to separate my two worlds. I'd rather not have my life have much if any bearing on my writing or people's perceptions of it.
This is the internet age. Effectively, everybody is famous. I mean you can google anybody's real name and probably find out more about them than they'd like you to know. You may not want your boss or your co-workers to know that you write erotica on the side, or slasher horror stories, or (god forbid) white-supremacist artlcles for some online neo-Nazi site.
I haven't heard much about the pros and cons of pen names other than to avoid overly-cutsie ones. I won't use a pen name if I ever get published. My name (Dylan Dockery) stands out without being too strange or hard to pronounce. I used to hate it though- I've heard all of the hickery dickery dockery, dill pickle, or just plain dickery jokes you can imagine.
Sometimes your name is difficult to pronounce and also you come across people who mispronounce your real name. At such times, It is good to use pen name.
I use a pen name for marketing and branding purposes. My real first name is pretty common, and my surname is a bit odd and always mispronounced. I have never felt comfortable with it. To me, it sounds more like a "serious"/ foreign name suitable for a lawyer or an accountant, rather than an adventure/comedy fiction writer.
Hi, I don't use a pen name, because I don't like the deceit of it. I think if I write something I should stand behind it, good or bad. That being said I'm sure there are many valid reasons for using a pen name. One reason I did consider one for a time though is because there are three other authors out there with my name, and I don't want to be confused with them. For that reason I shortened my first name from Gregory to Greg, which knocked out two of them at least. But whenever I google myself, their names still come up. On the other hand its quite fascinating to discover that I've also been writing books on law, ancient Greek art and political articals! Three topics I really can't stand! Cheers, Greg.
My name is my own, just as my writing is. I see no reason to hide it behind a nome de plume. - Darkkin
If I were to get published, I'd use a pen name, mostly because I'm a very private person. And I really dislike my read name. My hypothetical pen name is "SCIENCE" (yes, in all caps). I'm not even sorry.
Interesting pen name. Do you have a particular reason for it to be in all caps - or for it to just be the word "science," for that matter?
I just think "by SCIENCE" would look neat on a book cover. And I don't expect anyone to take me seriously, anyway. If I had a cool voice, I'd use that as my pseudonym and read audiobooks so that they can say "dictated by SCIENCE" on them.
There are certain circumstances where it is almost mandatory to use a pen name. Consider Harlequin and other serialized novels. If they have a successful line, they will use the first, successful author's name - we'll use the name Cara Passionata, just for fun - and continue to publish books under Cara's name using a "sweat shop" of writers all published under the name Cara Passionata. Now, Cara is not necessarily writing any of these books anymore, but her name continues to be seen on the cover of subsequent novels in the serial. And, worst of all, poor Cara has sold her rights to her own name to the publisher so she cannot write under her own name for other types of writing!
The reason I plan to use a pen name, is because I'm a nihilist. I don't exactly believe I exist. You could call me essentially insane if you please, but I just think differently than most. I look at things as simply atoms arranged in a certain way; I believe in the atoms, but not in us.
Popular authors use a pen-name when writing a different genre to the one the are known for, thus separating the two and avoiding confusion. I would say use your own name, unless you have good reason not to (hard to pronounce or your gender doesn't fit the genre you're writing for). On saying that the couple of things I've had published were published under my pet-name, being that I have been known by my pet-name since I was ten months old it feels more like my real name than my Christian name does. My Christian name is used solely by officialdom.
I almost felt compelled to use a pen name upon discovering that there is a small-press horror author named Nickolas Cook (my name is Nicholas Cooke, and I too write horror ). I've just decided to shorten my first name and throw in the middle as well -- Nick Allen Cooke. I think it seperates enough without having to use a different name entirely.
My pen name is actually my first, middle, and last initials in the form of a name. Like the character, Elphaba, from Wicked. Her name comes from L. Frank Baum's initials. El Fa Ba.
I have the same problem as Nicholas C, there is already a Tom Fletcher with at least two barely known horror stories under his belt, i don't know what to do about my pen name though, I kind of want to use my middle name of Peter, but Fletcher just doesn't roll of the tongue enough for me. Maybe its because i've been saying it for so long though
