What's Your Name?

What’s in a name?  That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. (William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet)

Pen name, author name, nom de plume, pseudonym...  Why would you choose to adopt a pen-name rather than your own name for your published writing? If you’re about to publish the novel it has taken you a long time to write, and you’re proud of what you’ve written, why use an author name?

The most obvious answer to this question is a simple desire for privacy. Whilst some writers crave the attention publication might bring, others shun the limelight, preferring to remain anonymous. Or an author might have another working life – say as an academic or a doctor or an electrician – and be reluctant to allow one to intrude on the other.

Another reason is a change of genre. Let’s say you’ve written five crime novels and now want to publish a romance. Your readers might not be too happy to find your characters falling in love when they expect them to be committing murder. Even a less radical change on your part, like writing similar novels but with another publisher might prompt you to find a new name.

In my own case, as I look forward to the publication of my début novel with TirgearrPublishing, I have a decision to make. Joan Fleming was the name of a successful British crime writer who died in 1980. She also wrote books for children. My book falls into the category of contemporary/romantic fiction. So what should I call myself?

I don’t have a middle name – no help there. I could use my maiden name: Joan Moore. The trouble is that I don’t identify with that name in my today-world. It belongs to a different chapter of my life when I didn’t write novels.

So, since I’ve no real wish to take on a new identity or indeed to resurrect my old one, I think I’ll simply write as who I am: Joan Fleming.

Do you write under your own name? Or under a pen name? Or both?