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This was a question to me from a writer just starting out. And I am going to answer it in bits, because I am too busy to sit down and write a long post this week.
So here’s Part One: THE PROBLEM
She has an unusual name (I’ve never come across it before) that is easily mispelled and mispronounced, and she doesn’t like it anyway. Let’s, for the sake of this post, call her Sally Sullimunder (and I hope there isn’t a real person out there with that name!). And let’s say she is thinking of calling herself Sally Tye.
Sounds like an easy call, doesn’t it? Become Sally Tye for your professional writing life!
But there’s a couple of catches that don’t make it so simple:
- She knows that a name change would be hurtful to her father, Mr Sullimunder, who’s proud of being a Sullimunder.
- And all those people who know her as Sally Sullimunder from kindy onwards are never going to know that the author Sally Tye is the person they grew up with/are now working with. And that’s a lost selling opportunity. (Most of us will buy a book by someone we know!)
So what should she do? She asked me because she knows I changed my name. Tomorrow I’ll talk about that.
In the meantime, what do all you readers of this blog think about the issue?
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A fern shoot on the dark of the forest floor heading for the light.
Grandson
The fabulous Raja Brooke – huge, too
“Dancing Ladies” 