When I started writing fiction, I decided to do so under a pen name. At the time it made sense. I was teaching, and my first novels were sexy hot. This is one of the most common reasons authors choose a pen name – not wanting to associate their everyday life with their writing. Other reasons for not using one’s given name include:

• A name that is already in use by another author or by a well-known personality.
• A name that is hard to pronounce.
• A name that is hard to spell.
• A name that is extremely common.
• A name you dislike.
• A name that doesn’t fit your genre.
• Desire for a name with a special meaning or in memory of a special person.

Choosing a Pen Name

All of the above reasons are important to consider in selecting a pen name to replace your given one. Here are some tips for selecting the best name for you.

1. Most author sites list by first name so if you want to be seen first, choose a first name starting with one of the early letters like A or B. Zara is on the last page in most places. However, its not the end of the world to be in the middle or at the end. I haven’t noticed a problem being a Z name.
2. Shorter names fit better on book covers.
3. Make the name memorable and not hard or confusing to spell. As someone who reviews lots of books and interviews authors, I hate when I have to keep looking up the author’s name in order to spell it right.
4. Choose a name that is easy to say. You don’t want to be correcting your podcast host or the person who introduces you at a book signing.
5. Make sure no other author is using your proposed pen name and that you can get a url in that name. Warning, if you search for the name you want using .com at the end, sometimes sellers buy it up hoping you will buy it from them for a higher price. Better to search the name as something like Zara West Author and see what comes up. You can also search on Amazon and in World Cat, the biggest collection of books on the web. https://www.worldcat.org  If you are doing a WordPress-hosted site, you can use their url domain picker to test out names.
6. If the url or the name you want is used by a non-author, you can still use it if you add author or writer at the end of the name. Avoid the mistake I made by adding suspense and romance after my pen name url, as it limits the genre you can write.
7. Next check that the name is available on the social media you plan to use
8. Watch out that the name is not a brand. I didn’t realize that Zara was a clothing store. Since in my case it is only the first name, there is no liability problem, but if the brand or trademark is exactly the same as your choice, you will have big legal problems.
9. Lastly, check out the name with your friends, family, and fellow writers. Do they think it fits you and the genre of book you are writing? Does it flow off the tongue?

Setting Up a Pen Name

Once you have a pen name, you need to establish it as a professional name.

• Buy the url for your domain and set up your author website. (Even if your book is not written yet, do this first. A domain in your chosen name is the hardest thing to get and is essential for your writing career.)
• Create an email account using your pen name.
• Open social media accounts in your new pen name. Hint: If you have personal accounts on one browser like Chrome, Opera, Firefox, etc., open your pen name accounts on a another web browser. This makes it less confusing for you. You will be yourself on the first and your author persona on the other. The browsers also get use to you searching under that name and so will work more smoothly and become customized for the two different personas.
• If you will be selling on Amazon, open an Author Central Account in your pen name.
• Use your pen name when subscribing to writing groups and writing workshops. You want your fellow authors to know you as your author name. This is problem I have when setting up an author interview and emails from the interviewee come from a different name.
• Writing and selling books is a business. Open a business bank account. This is where your royalties will be deposited.
• File a doing Business As form with the county clerk.
• Set up any PayPal, Square, Stripe, Shopify, Venmo, etc. online accounts that you will be using to pay author costs under your pen name.
• Charge cards: I have Zara West on my business Discovercard. Apparently they will put any name you want on a card if you ask.
• Consider an LLC. I also established a Zara West LLC just for my royalties so that my children can get them easily when I pass.
• Order business cards and swag using your pen name.

The Problem with Pen Names

Pen names are great for authors whose works are similar and appeal to the same audience and whose credentials support their work. They do not work so well if you want to write in a very different genre or if you want to use your credentials to validate your writing skills. This is what happened to me.

When I proposed my writing craft series Write for Success to my agent, she asked me under what name I wanted to publish. I realized that if I used my Zara West persona, I could not cite my degree and my extensive teaching and non-fiction credentials. So these were published under my given name Joan Koster.

When I branched into biographical fiction I knew that I was appealing to a totally different audience than Zara West did. So I choose to publish That Dickinson Girl and Censored Angel as Joan Koster as well.

These two decisions meant that I needed to set up all the above business elements under my author name Joan Koster. Luckily, I had bought the domain name years ago, and I had an email account. And while there are numerous Joan Koster authors, it seems I am the only fiction writer.

Nevertheless, writing under two different names is twice the work. It means double social media posts, double blogs, double emails to check, and more. So before you consider using a pen name, peer into the future and ask:

Will the name you pick work for everything you might consider writing in the future?

Do you have credentials you will not be able to use?

If you are not sure, are you willing to do twice the work to support having two names at some time in the future?

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Do you have a pen name? Why or why not?