Question regarding writing different genres...

Hi,

I should probalby ask this in the screenwriting section too, but I figure I will probably get a better answer here.

Anyway, I've been developing a lot of ideas for stories. Some of them will probably be better as a movie (since I don't want to develop the characters too much, and some of the actions are probably better seen on film than in writing), and some will come in books first.

However, the genres for those ideas are not the same either. Right now I have a medieval fantasy (Braveheart settings, but fictional lands), Christian, fantasy (talking animals, think Disney-type movie), sci-fi (think Star Wars), and action (a sort of Die-Hard).

My question is, I've heard that sometimes writers use pseudonyms when writing different genres. Would I have to do something like that too? Or can I just use one name and bring all those books/scripts out (the scripts probably won't matter as much, since apparently screenwriters in general get treated slightly better than trash, and from what I'm told, I'll probably get replaced by another writer anyway)?

I suppose this is more of a "worry about it later" type question, but I'm just curious about how it's done, so if I have to use different names, I can start making them up too hehe (although in all probability, I'll probably just stick to one name since I dont want to have to remember 50 different names either, esp if I discover a good name I want to use for a character hehe. There's two things I hate about writing, coming up with decent sounding names that haven't been used yet, and coming up with titles for the stories. Only one of my stories even has a title so far hehe).

Heh, I just started a similar thread and I also posted it in the screenwriting forum.

It seems to me most authors use psuedonyms for different genres if that are not so easily recognized by the public. stephen King, Dean Koontz and JK Rowling can write whatever genre they want and sell it by name alone.

Try selling something first and seeing where it goes from there. Your life and ideas will probably be very different by that point.

Stephen King, is, in my opinion, anyway, the poster boy for genre-hopping among current genre novels. The man does it all. His stuff's focused on the horror, or the supernatural stuff, but there's SO MUCH out there, particularly his short stories--which are farking wonderful, I'll tell you that--that fit into the closest "Mainstream Fiction" rack you can find.

Love King.

At any rate, I think I'd worry more about the pseudonym thing if you're an author than a screenwriter--not many moviegoers go to the movie based on the screenwriter--some, of course, but not many.

Whereas in the novel world, names are just as much a part of marketing as the title and the cover art. As Jim McDonald explains it, the Pseudonyms are there to protect the reader--if he likes Jim McDonald's first two books, why wouldn't he like the third? Well, maybe because Jim's first two books were sci-fi, where this one's a romantic western. The books may be equally as good, but that won't necessarily matter to the reader, particularly if he doesn't care for romantic westerns (maybe he watched Lonesome Dove one too many times--I know I did...) In this way, it also protects the writer against losing a reader who thinks that Jim's gone off his rails writing this romantic western stuff. But as he also says, don't worry about it, you'll have plenty of time to hash out the details with your publisher before the book comes out.

Some writers not only develop pen names for various genres, but the pen names themselves become seperate characters.

To put it another way, they don't just come up with a pen name, they create a character that would use that name. For instance I might write humor under Lame Duck, a sort of garrulous guy with lots of quips. Then write adventure under the name Macho Moody, a somewhat monosylic guy with a stern expression.

Do this well and people can see you in two interviews back to back and not realize you are the same person.

pseudonyms

I can't speak for screenwriting but when it comes to novels, pseudonym use is quite common when a writer switches genres, even among the big names. Dean Koontz, who someone mentioned above, has written and published under several pseudonyms. The only one I can recall at the moment is Leigh Nichols, which he used to publish his romantic suspense novels, but there are others.

Beth

Re: pseudonyms

Here goes Koontz and a bunch a alters