Here’s the thing. I did not expect to get published. I had enough to think about in even finishing a book, let alone sending it off to an agent. Still, in my far-off dreams on the subject I had considered that any form of my name(s) would not work well on the cover of a book because, just as Courtney Schafer complained about her own, nobody spells them correctly. Ever. So when people were suddenly using words like “contract” and “payment” and then I also heard “pseudonym,” decades of correcting credit card representatives and RMV workers had me primed to agree.
There is a strategy to pseudonyms. You want to appear on the right place on the shelf; send a message about your identity (‘Raven’ sends one message, ‘Suzy’ another); show some musicality or rhythm your real name doesn’t have; and leave certain bits of information out of the picture, in many cases gender. (more…)
Read More...
Let me tell you, it’s great to be a fantasy writer. The sky’s the limit. Imagination is my oyster. I can do anything I want. I don’t have to obey the constraints of politics or physics. I can ignore the boundaries of biology and geography. I can imagine bold and exciting new worlds and populate them with amazing races. I can push my readers to the limit, expand their horizons.