Planned on a Pen Name

MatchmakerJane · Oct 13, 2008

I'm getting ready to submit my stuff to agents. The one thing that has me scratching my head is that my idea was to write my memoir under a pen name. I have given pseudonyms to everyone in the book including myself. Now I'm concerned about presenting the book to agents.

I've read on here that agents worry about people writing books under pen names. I would hate to close doors before they even open.

My initial reaction is to change my name in the book back to my actual name than discuss the situation with my agent when the time comes.

Does anyone have any advice on how to handle this?

Thanks in advance.

MsGneiss · Oct 14, 2008

I think that this is something that you should wait to discuss with your agent once you have a signed agreement. I believe that if you change all the names, it can no longer be a memoir, but rather fiction, or a roman a clef. Do correct me if I am wrong.

MatchmakerJane · Oct 14, 2008

Well it only becomes fiction if you take liberties with the situations and change them. The only thing I did was change peoples name and change the name of a company, which is pretty common in memoir.

Thanks for your input. I figured when the time comes that an agent requests a full they will see that I want to write under a pen name.

Madisonwrites · Oct 14, 2008

I suggest going on Google and searching for queries by authors who write under pen names. I read one where a lady put her pen name and real name in the query and still got the agent and is published. If only I could remember the rest!

MatchmakerJane · Oct 15, 2008

Thanks Madison.

The more I read about pen names the more I see how common they are. It seems that a lot of times agents recommend people pick a pen name due to the difficulty of someones name. That's one reason that I've chosen a pen name. My last name is difficult to spell as is my first name. The pen name I picked out is easy to remember and spell. I think I've stopped worrying.

There's too many panic attack moments in this process!!!!

Stacia Kane · Oct 15, 2008

Madisonwrites said:
I suggest going on Google and searching for queries by authors who write under pen names. I read one where a lady put her pen name and real name in the query and still got the agent and is published. If only I could remember the rest!

I signed my real name on my query but mentioned both of my pen names, i.e "As December Quinn I've published X; my first urban fantasy, written as Stacia Kane, will be released in April..."

On the ms itself in the upper left on the first page, where name etc. goes, I wrote my real name and then in parentheses "w/a Stacia Kane".

It's very simple; I don't think any of the agents I queried batted an eye over it. I mentioned the pen names in the query in case the agent wanted to hunt up my credits and on the ms so the agent knew which name I thought the book would work under.

Had I not had credits, I probably wouldn't have mentioned it in the query, but still would have put it on the first page of the ms. JMO.

(Oh, and as an aside; of course I picked a pen name because I was writing erotic romance, but not so much to hide as because my actual last name contains an unfortunate similarity to a very dirty word. One misread/mispronounced vowel sound and I'm a dirty joke. Think, frex, "Canter".

)

MatchmakerJane · Oct 16, 2008

Thanks DQ - I figured as much but its good to hear from someone how they handled the situation. I've adjusted my MS to include the "as Jane Sinclair" line so that way there is no confusion.

BTW I love December Quinn - it sounds so romantic!

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