How to Create Your Perfect Pen Name
By Bill Ferris | August 17, 2013 |
Nom de plume. Pseudonym. Literary double. Even the term “pen name” has pen names. Now you’re thinking of using one; maybe your real name is hard to spell, or you want to differentiate your brand, or you don’t want your ex-wife to know about some extra income. You thought naming a baby was hard? Try naming yourself when there’s money and fame at stake. Robert Galbraith nearly died of starvation before J.K. Rowling gave him a cot and fed him three squares a day. Then there are genre concerns — you can’t write about a street-smart private eye if your pen name is Mellificient Elfwing, and Dashiel Hardcase presents problems if you’re writing fantasy about unicorns. Here are some time-tested methods to create a pen name that will be more famous and successful than whatever nonsense is on your birth certificate.
photo by Amy Strachan
Method 1: Found Object
Picture your protagonist’s bedroom. What’s the first thing she lays eyes on when she wakes up in the morning? If you write horror, it could be a writhing eldritch horror creeping toward…yikes, let’s start over. If you write YA, the first thing your protagonist sees is probably a book — nobody loves books as much as protagonists in young adult novels. From there you can free-associate names like Henrietta Papercut or Penelope Inksmudge or Elizabeth Spinecrack or Angelique Deadtree or Daphne Dustjacket. Easy as pie. (Those names are up for grabs, by the way. You can claim them in the comments section.)
[pullquote]If you come up with Ke$ha L. Ron Rico, please stop writing, because you have terrible taste in everything.[/pullquote]
Method 2: Use a Formula
Quick, what’s the first name of your protagonist’s favorite singer? What’s the first initial of your least-favorite Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle? Now tell me your favorite brand of liquor. For me, Robert Plant plus Raphael plus Kraken rum gives me Robert R. Kraken — I’ve already harangued my parents for not giving me this name. You’re on the right track if you end up with something like John D. Morgan or Nico R. Dubonnet. If you come up with Ke$ha L. Ron Rico, please stop writing, because you have terrible taste in everything.
[pullquote]Your pen name will need her own website and Twitter account. Her own book tour. Her own wardrobe. Family history. Government-issued ID card. Passport. Swiss bank account. A chalet in the Alps far from your obligations and creditors.[/pullquote]
Method 3: Easy as A, B, C (but mostly A)
As long as you’re creating a name from scratch, get something early in the alphabet so you’ll jump to the front of the bookshelf in the stores. A is one of those letters that you can stick a couple of them at the front of pretty much any name and it’ll sound good. Alex Aaron, isn’t bad. Aabraham Aafalava is better. A Writer’s Digest report predicts authors will break the three-A barrier by 2015.
Method 4: The Mary Sue
If you were truly interesting, your publisher wouldn’t have asked you to use a pen name. Life may have shattered your non-literary dreams, but your alias can live the life you’ve always dreamed of by giving her an over-idealized, impossible-to-disprove backstory. Your fictional you can pursue exotic pastimes you could never pull off in your real life: Run with the bulls! Take up falconry! Buy a motorcycle! Have meaningful relationships with functional adults! All these far-fetched goals are now within your pseudonym’s pseudo-grasp. This requires all your character-creation skills — you’re no longer creating a mere name, you’re conjuring a living, breathing human being, with thoughts and feelings. She’ll need her own website and Twitter account. Her own book tour. Her own wardrobe. Family history. Government-issued ID card. Passport. Swiss bank account. A chalet in the Alps far from your obligations and creditors.
If these methods failed to produce a name you like (unlikely), I will hand-craft a bespoke, artisanal pen name for you. I will do this for free if you agree to use the first name I give you. Yes, this is a binding agreement.
After college, Bill Ferris (he/him) left Nebraska for Florida to become a rich and famous rock star. Failing that, he picked up the pen to become a rich and famous novelist. He now lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and looks forward to a life of poverty and ridicule.
This had me laughing the whole way through. Thank you.
Also, I’m hereby claiming Aamanda Aafalava.
Thanks, Aamanda, I’m glad you enjoyed it!
Ha, ha, ha! I do use a pen name (just in case those boring corporate folks I work with discover what I do in my spare time) and I’m very nearly in a chalet in the Alps – well, ok, a house at the foothills of the Alps and on the French rather than the Swiss side of the border, but it’s the principle that counts, right. I’m heading in the right direction!
I can’t remember the Ninja turtles, but I used a combination of advice and have come up with the delightful second pen name of A. David Bombay Sapphire.
Using your formula, I will be David M. Bombay. Which actually isn’t bad, although better without the “M.” David Bombay. He writes literary fiction so overblown in its historical references and navel-gazing that people things it’s satire, and he’s able to achieve his dream, the secret dream he didn’t tell anyone he had: he writes for The Onion.
Great fun post :-)
Hahahaha! I loved this. Thank you for the gift of giggles on this cloudy Seattle Saturday.
I hereby christen myself Giggles O’Grumpersberg. I always like to Germanacise my pen names, though this morning I seem to have added a bit of the blarney too. Plus, the “giggle” vs. “grump” kind of sums it all up and leaves people wondering . . . is she giggley or is she grumpy? Is she Irish or German? Who knows!
You rock, Bill. Thanks for being a part of the community.
I reject all this silly follderall and insist on using my true, given name. The reading public can lump it or leave it. Harrumph.
Abercrombi N. Fitchberg
Oh my. So many choices. For my thrillers, perhaps Alexis A. Aardvark. For my romance novels, Rhiannon M. Maclallan. I’ll stay Betsy Ashton for my women’s fiction.
Betsy Ashton’s latest blog post: A Whacked Out Author Interview https://bit.ly/WriteNowRightNow
I plucked mine from my family names.
Delightful post! Your suggestions work well for character names, too. :D
Triple A’s? Wonder when we’ll begin with numerals? 1derful Reading, or perhaps 1derworks Abound. :P
Sadly, I think we’re still about 5-10 years away from numerals, but we’ll get there eventually!
Ha. Bill, your posts always leave me laughing. I settled on CG and my real last name. I didn’t want to mix my author and professional identities. I was going to use the most interesting man in the world for my back story, but that was taken already. Stay thirsty, my friends,
Mine is Annie Freewriter. Claimed, stamped, and delivered.
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Quite possibly my favorite WU post ever.
And yours is my favorite comment ever, at least until the next person showers me with glowing praise.
Awesome. I’m totally going to use this someday, although for now I’ll take exception with the advice to pick a name in the As. As a B name myself, I know we beginning-of-the-alphabet people are on the top shelf, far left. In some stores that’s waaayyyyy above eye level.
If I use a pen name at some point, I’m going straight for the Ms!
I chose a word I really like, but is unknown to most. Petrichor. The smell of the earth after a heavy rainfall. From there, the last name just sort of felt like it fit. So it’s Petrichor Night for me!
Greetings, Petrichor Night. That’s quite a name! I like it both as the name of an author and a holiday.
Hello,
I was trying to come up with a perfect pen name to start over with, and i happened across your blog.
I didn’t use any of your ideas and I would not like to claim any, but I was wondering if you could give your opinion on the one I came up with.
I chose Vera Blackwood simply because the names both have meaning to me and because it’s close to the beginning of the alphabet.
Let me know, please.
Hello, Samantha! I think Vera Blackwood is a splendid pen name. But because I didn’t think of it myself, I’m overcome with jealousy and must therefore advise you not to use it.
(But in all seriousness, I think that’s a really good pen name.)
Fabulously funny post…thanks!
Having assisted others with the creation of PEN NAMES…funny that I find now an actual method. I’ve always started with the genre and asked myself who would be the all-time hero in this lane of writing.
Romance: Crystals Waters – Astoria Flowers – Christy Blu – Ruby Star.
Thrillers: Storm Night – Lemar Shadow – Blake Chase.
(Do help yourself to any of these…if they are being used, I’m unaware of it)
My thoughts are that one ought to pick something that is sustainable over a lifetime of writing. Additionally, those publishing in multiple genres or with different styles may choose to develop more than one pen name. Prepare first for multiple personality disorder, and be creative enough to manage the lives of the characters you charge with your own pen.
Branding is the all important task of the day, so do use the one perfect way to choose a proper pen name. Make sure that it’s FUN, because you may be stuck with it for a long time!