I happen to like my name. We’ve been friends since birth. No, I’m not that economist currently in the news. Even Google Alerts got confused. Hey Google, the economist is Stephen—that’s with a “ph” not a “v.” I’m Steven. I’m no relation to Mark Moore either. And I’ve never played with the New England Patriots. And I’m not that other author Steven Moore or the felon Steven Moore. Etc. Etc.

I am an ex-scientist who once worked with terabytes of data and tried to make sense of them (something that economist Stephen never has done, I’m sure). That work often involved statistical analysis (maybe the economist understands stats?). Now I’d like to know some other stats, though: Is Steve Moore more common than Joe Smith? I’ve never personally known a Joe Smith (or John Doe, for that matter), but I once knew a Joel Smee—we competed for the first trombone chair in high school.

Because I like my name, even though it’s common, I chose to use it in my writing. Some people choose a pseudonym. I chose to stick with my given name—never thought much about a pseudonym when I was getting ready to publish my prose. (Maybe I should have? Something like Lee Child? Hmm. That one was already taken.) They say hindsight is twenty-twenty, so at times during my writing career I’ve wondered if I could have done better and become better known with a fake name. But maybe hindsight needs corrective lenses, and it sure isn’t a time machine—I can’t go back and change that decision.

When I wonder about pen names, I can rationalize my choice by asking; Would it have made any difference? I’ll rephrase that question: Does a reader choose a book by an unknown author on the basis of the author’s name? Yeah, maybe, if the name is very unusual, but not if it’s a common name, maybe just a symbol (I throw that in for “Purple Rain” fans—I like that song too). A reader will choose a new book by an already known author because s/he liked that author’s previous books, but they’ll be attracted to the unknown author’s book by other things, all related to the book itself. One exception might be a memoir after the reader peruses an interesting bio, an extreme case being an autobiography. (Some unknown authors might write these, but that would be unusual.)

In other words, books will be chosen because of an author’s name only if the reader recognizes it, or thinks s/he does. So we can now settle an important chicken-or-the-egg problem: Offering an interesting novel to the reading public always comes first. As the number of interesting novels written by the author increases, so will an author’s name recognition, unless s/he starts writing bombs. Even then, I think most readers will pardon a few bombs.

When authors think about the issue in this way, they should realize that name recognition should never be the main goal for a fiction writer. Creating good stories should. And whether an author’s name is Jane or John Doe, Joe Smith, or Steve Moore, or some unusual pen name, readers won’t care as long as the story works for them.

I can only think of one valid reason now for wanting to go back in time and choose a pseudonym: keeping my writing life separated from my personal life. Sometimes that could be an advantage. But I want my readers to know me by my real name, to realize I’m a real person just like them who happens to love storytelling. So that’s what readers get. Almost. (I’ll leave you to figure out what that means!)

***

Comments are always welcome.

Mind Games. Coming soon from A. B. Carolan and Carrick Publishing. Della Dos Toros has powers her adopted father didn’t want her to use, but she must use them to find his killer. This new young adult sci-fi mystery will take a peek into the far future when humans want to give ESP powers to androids. It’s set in the same sci-fi universe as A. B.’s The Secret Lab and The Secret of the Urns, and my Chaos Chronicles Trilogy and Dr. Carlos stories. For young adults and adults who are young-at-heart, this action-packed sci-fi novel might just blow your mind.

Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 2nd, 2019 at 3:30 am and is filed under Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.