Pen names:
An author uses a pen name for various reasons, to hide their gender, to make their name more distinctive, if they write different genres and want to distance them from previous works and for many other reasons.
A pen name can be a version of your actual name.
But how do you decide to use a nom de plume? If you feel it’ll work best for you go for it.
How do decide what name to use?
My options (using my real name) are:
Louise Miller
L. M. H. Miller
Louise M H Miller
Louise M Miller
Louise H Miller
L Miller
L M Miller
L H Miller
And that’s just variants of my name not even using a different name(s) completely.
There’s numerous websites to help you choose a pen name if that’s what you’re looking for. Just a quick Google search for ‘pen name generator’ brings up lots of options.
Here are some General Name ideas for me from one website after inputting a few answers:
(I don’t honestly think I’ll be using any of these – but it’s a bit of fun)
Sam Roehampton
L. A. Millard
Louise A. Milan
Lazarus Middleton
Sam Alexs
Lorraine Milbert
Lawrence A. Roehampton
Lora Louson
The majority of the other websites simply gives you a name.
Do you use one of these websites or generate one yourself? Using these generators can be useful in giving you a head start, a prompt, to pick a pen name.
Do you use your real name or a nom de plume?
