The only thing I’ve been steadfast on is that I never want to become an author whose name was bigger than the title. Since I’m still a literal no name without a published work, it’s pretty egotistical of me to assume that someday I’ll be big enough that my name will sell better than the title. Now don’t misunderstand me. I hold no disdain for those authors or the publishing companies that make those choices. There have been many of my favorite authors whose books I discovered by walking past a book with their name splayed across it in size 97 font. But between me and my books, I would every time rather have my books be famous than me (again, egotistical to assume fame will come with the deal, but let’s just look past that for the rest of the post so I stop interrupting myself). I would rather be the proud but otherwise obscure author parent who can brag that she brought into life the book children who later went on to do great things. That is the great benefit to being an author. Except for the super famous few—yes, I mean you, Mrs Rowling–names get famous while faces get to enjoy anonymity. And with pen names, even real names can maintain their old lifestyle without hearing “you’re not that one are you?” every time you sign your name.
Now this is where I get contrary to what I said before, because I have always intended to put my real name on the cover. if I really wanted to keep attention to a minimum, wouldn’t I want a pen name to take the credit for my books? I guess in the strictest argument that is correct, but the only real retort I can give is that it never felt right. Some times I wonder what I would have for a pen name without anything ever jumping out. Perhaps I just don’t want to take a name out of my list of characters (you may notice that I instinctively avoid “Angela”). Perhaps I subconsciously do want fame. Freud still hasn’t returned my calls on that one.
But in the past year or so, the idea of seeing my full name on a published work has inspired both a sense of pride and terror. I sealed my real name fate when I created this website with my real name printed in various locations. Even with a pen name, which I still don’t really want, it wouldn’t be hard to find out my real one. Not only that, I have a very average name which works both for and against me. It’s harder to trace than a unique name (strangers finding out where I live inspires all sorts of horror movie scenarios in my head), yet it gets buried amongst all the others. It’s easily remembered, if not often misspelled. Wost of all, it’s very feminine. Which I never really thought about until I started reading in articles over and over again that boys are less likely to pick up a book with a female name on the cover as they’ll assume it was a book “written for girls.” Now there was a time when I considered myself an author for young adult women, until I started this site and saw my followers split down the gender middle and decided I should let my demographic decide itself and not rule out the boys. Which meant I needed to really consider whether I wanted to use my very female first name.
So this is where we get to my very anti-climactic decision. Because it was when I was reading an article about JK Rowling, and how she was urged to use initials so as not to alienate her male readers. And just like that I knew that’s what I wanted to do too. As common as pen names, advertising the last name while initialing the first gives me that modicum of anonymity while letting me keep that claim to authorship (I can only imagine using a pen name and trying to convince the people around me that I’m that person. No really! I wrote this!). A. M. Rodgers. I think it has a nice look to it.
