Authors, titles and character names.
I’ve had a fabulous first week on Twitter. Facebook friends have been sharing my page and links to my blog. I’m overwhelmed by the generosity of the writing community.
Another thing I’m overwhelmed by – just how many people write. Not just write for the fun of it but have completed books and want to get them published. How do you stand out in a sea of names? I feel like a tiny drop in a literary ocean.
Names and titles were already on my mind. My own author name. My book title. My character names. I’m promoting my work-in-progress manuscript, The Abandoned Apprentice from the Erebus Chronicles, and myself, P L Hocking, as an author. (Noice! I slipped those in neatly.) I need to promote myself now, before the book is 100 percent finished. I need to generate interest in myself and my book. I need a brand name for myself and my book. But I’m also aware that my eventual publishers will have a say in a book title and possibly my name. So, for now, I need to make the best decisions I can on my own, or with some help and answers from the fabulous writing community and friends.
The nom-de-plume or pen-name is used for a number of different reasons. Firstly, people might want to disguise their identity. Can you see Peter Parker being able to continue his daily existence as a high-school student if the world knew his after-hours calling? He would be mobbed with fans. Or haters.
In the same way, authors might choose to keep their super-hero literary abilities separate from their ordinary life. Fame is not for everyone.
Another reason authors use a name-of-the-feather is because they write in several genres and don’t want to confuse their followers or booksellers. Although I’m only starting out, I have written several picture books that I will shortly start to send out to publishers. I also intend to write in general adult. I don’t want readers to click on one of my links expecting post-apocalyptic dystopian fantasy and getting fluffy ducklings or introspective housewives. I’ll use Priscilla Hocking (my secret identity is out!) as my author name for my general adult books. Although my adult book will be a work of fiction, it draws heavily on my experience as a professional orchestral musician. I worked full-time in the industry for eighteen years so my name has marketing potential. For my children’s books, I’m not sure. Possibly Cilla Hocking or maybe a creative Lemony Snicket-style name. But then, tell me…Does that mean I have to do this website-creating, blogging, building up a fan base ALL OVER AGAIN?
Using initials only instead of a full first name could make connection to me less personal. Do you feel disconnected not knowing what an author‘s first name is? In the past, using initials could disguise the gender of the author, to avoid bias. I hope that these considerations are not as important in our enlightened age of gender-equality. (Lol or insert your emoji of choice.) Does the sexism work both ways? I’ve heard there is the prejudiced idea that male authors can’t write a good romance and females a good sci-fi fantasy.
If you’re starting out and deciding on your name, you might want to check in with Mr Google to see if he knows of lots of other people with your name and take note if they are famous, especially in your field. I was toying with the idea of being Priscilla King. I’d use my uncommon first name and the final four letters of my last name. King is a nice, authory name. However, a quick internet search revealed there are hundreds of Priscilla Kings on the planet. Hockings are fewer.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I conceived the idea for my current book as a teenager and I’ll admit the title that I had back then was important to me. I called it On the Other Side of Darkness, and I thought it was brilliant. The spaceship went through a black hole which transported the characters into another world. Darkness, black hole, the other side…get it? Inspired, or at least my fifteen-year-old self thought so. A few years later, a Seinfeld episode came out that featured a straight-to-video movie. Guess what it was called? The Other Side of Darkness was lost for me. A sad, day for me when they stole my title.
Shakespeare’s Juliet thought that a name didn’t affect the quality and attractiveness of a person or object. Roses are sweet and Romeo was hot. Modern media marketing says otherwise. Names can make or break you. Or is there an in-between?
Most of my characters have undergone name changes including the two main characters. Marli, the protagonist, was originally Maya. A classmate noticed that I shortened her name to May which didn’t fit in with how she, the reader had been saying it in her head. So how did I say it? To be honest, it had been May-a initially and then I changed it to My-a, shortened from full name Amaya. But I kept calling her Maya in my head. My classmate also mentioned that she would feel differently about her if she was May-a. Next, I changed her name completely because I suddenly saw the name’s similarity to Yar, who is one of my male characters. It’s good to make sure that you don’t have too many characters starting with the same letter. I decided that the same applied to similar syllables. My feedback readers were not sure about Marli at first. It took a while for me to get used to her new name but it has the advantage of being less used and also androgynous. Now I love it.
This name-change experience sent my brain-cogs whirring and was the starting point for this post. People do have strong connections to names. How many times have you heard people say they hate a particular name because there was a bully at school that had that name? How few Adolfs or Attilas are walking the streets all because of the legacy their name left behind? Conversely, have you ever met someone, had a preconceived dislike of their name, but then come to love the name because it is theirs and you love them? New parents occasionally wait until their baby is born to see what name suits them. I’ve always been surprised that there aren’t more Redprunes or Hairyann-Screamins walking the Earth as a result. But our name grows to suit us. If you look at your children or relatives or friends, can you imagine them with any other name? To me, the name grows into the person. Marli is well and truly Marli and feels like she has always been. But if I have to change it again, I will. And it will blossom and grow like a rose, the way names do.