Pseudonyms & Professional Work

Voirey-Linger wrote:
This is incorrect.using a pen name is NOT doing business under an assumed name. Business is done under one's given name and that will be on the contracts and on the checks. Doing business under an assumed name means the contract and checks are not under one's real name.

Submit using your given name writing as your pen name. The pen name appears on the cover and marketing and can even be used on the copyright page. Givenl name need only appear on the legal paperwork, and it's all on the up-and-up.

Perhaps, it's the type of stories you write, or don't write? You send a store out, and you don't want your real name associated with it, it is more that just a pen name. More and more companies are investigating what tracks are left by potential employes on the Internet. Now if you are just Joe Blow, a nobody who will always be nothing more than a nobody it will not matter. :) if however your name is already something the public is aware of it just might matter a lot to you.

Lots of famous authors are known to have written under a pen name. If that is what you want, then yes simply request it be published under a pen name.

Some people are happy to put nude pictures of themselves up on the Internet, you can find lots of them. Some people have learn to regret that choice, later in life. You write erotic fiction, that involves children, or rape, or a number of other things, and it is always possible that it will come back to haunt you. If one submits a story, and uses their real name, it is out in the Internet. There are always people willing to make a buck. Just as there are people willing to embarrass another. The more famous you are the more likely someone is to make the connection. If one writes a story about getting a teen drunk, and having sex with her, does that mean in real life that is what one wants to do? Yet there will be people who assume that is exactly what one wants.

Lots of people have jobs that require them to be of good moral character, generally people that are to some degree public figures. You're right I can request that a pen name be used. But what if the company messes up? What if a disgruntled employee decides to get back at the publisher, by selling their true names? If we are adults and can be honest, the simple fact is there are a number of people who see writing erotic fiction, as less than a good thing to be doing.

Certainly one can say there is nothing wrong with erotic fiction, that they don't have an issue with erotic fiction being attached to their name. Good for them! But not everyone will see it that way. So I can claim to write erotic fiction, my neighboors can claim I write porn, and my partner's employer can think their employee's partner is a pervert. Perhaps at some point in the future people won't think that way. Perhaps the next time I send out a manuscript, the publisher will be so impressed with it that they won't try to see what else I've been upto on the Internet.

My post was NOT to suggest that using a pen name was doing business under an assumed name. Just to acknowledge that some people might want to do buisness under an assume name, and that there are ways one can.