Thread: Pseudonym

I'm in the process of polishing off a short story that I've knocked together, and I'm looking at a few magazines to send it to. I'm interested in publishing under a pseudonym, but I'm unsure of the convention in that sense. Are magazine publishers comfortable with authors using pseudonyms? And during submission, I'm assuming that explicitly state that I want to be published under that name and use my real name on the official document and so forth?

This sounds very amateurish for me to be asking at so late a stage, but my research has been geared towards novel publication thus far, and any input would be appreciated.

Thanks guys.

In the cover letter you send with your story I believe you would use your real name and state somewhere within the letter your desire to publish under the pseudonym. Also, on the first page of your manuscript, in the upper left-hand corner of the page, you will put your real name and contact information (address, phone #, e-mail). Under the title of your story you will put your by-line, which would then be your pseudonym.

Sorry - Who are you?

Thanks Terry, sounds reasonable, just wanted to check.

And bloggsworth...I'm me?

The way I see it, if you want to publish more at a later time, and you want to recognized that "that guy who wrote that frigging awesome short story in that magazine last month!", I'd use your real name. Unless you always want to be known as "Blank Name", that is . . .

Why do you want to publish under an alias?

I don't think it's weird or anything. I know authors do it all the time. I'm just curious about your specific reason to do so.

It's a good point. Is there any reason to use an alias, or is it being done simply because.....

In my case, my name's so boring that not either having an alias or playing around with my name to make it more appealing would be foolish.

In this case, I want to write under the guise of one of the characters in a novel that I'm writing, who's a short story writer.

Originally Posted by KyleColorado

Why do you want to publish under an alias?

Lots of reasons for using pen names. In my case, I own books by four other writers with the same name as me and there are six of us with screenwriting credits on IMDB... why add to the confusion?

As mentioned above, just ensure you put both names on the cover in the relevant place and no-one should be at all surprised about it. But I wouldn't do that unless it's a name you plan to continue using as otherwise no-one will be able to connect your new stories to this one.

For different reasons because of time, place, and circumstance I've written under several names over the past half century. I've not published under my birth name since I was a teen-ager at uni. Agents, publishers, and, most important, banks, have always known my 'real' name, but the op-ed piece condemning the cruelties of a military dictatorship needs a different byline from the objective report in the same magazine describing the latest developments in the civil war.

In turning now to writing and possibly publishing fiction, I've given some thought to a new name to use and have even considered, and rejected, using my birth name. Something with a bit of class is needed, along the lines of 'Flash Jerozalsky' to attract the attention of the serious-minded reader.

garza - If perchance your novel(s) is/are set in South Asia, you might consider a name like Mung Beene.

Originally Posted by The Backward OX

garza - If perchance your novel(s) is/are set in South Asia, you might consider a name like Mung Beene.

There's always the silverware method. (toss it in the air and record the sound effects)terrible..