I'm going to make sweeping generalisations in this post, so be warned. It's just something that has been bothering me for about, oh I don't know, five years? I'm of course talking about the VERY serious issue of pen names. Or, for those of you who like to sound intelligent (I know I do!), pseudonyms.
Yes, I totally went there. My issue with them is that some people have a natural head start with them, because their parents thought ahead and gave them easy-to-pronounce first names. And although they had less choice about them, they usually have snappy last names to go with their wonderfully simple (but effective) first names. Like Samuel Snow, Marcy Hubbard and Candy Water*. And these are just people I know.
People have been struggling to say my name since I was four. It's the reason why I only go by 'Terri' nowadays as opposed to my full first name. As a girl who has six names (two first, two middle and two last), it's been easy to introduce myself to people: "Hi, my name is really long. It has fifteen syllables in fact". But as an aspiring author, I'm starting to wonder what would be appropriate for my pseudonym.
It would have to be something easy to read, and nothing too restrictive for my readers. Which actually rules out using my real name. Also, it doesn't help that I recently discovered that one of my surnames was my nan's husband's name - the husband who isn't even my grandfather. I should have at least had my nan's maiden name, or my grandpa's surname, or both!
I guess this all means that when the time comes to publish my first book, I'll have a wealth of choices for a pseudonym. And nobody ever said having options was a bad thing.
*names have been parodied because I didn't ask their permission to use their real ones. But my point is still evident.
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