Does anyone write under two different names?

[Swilly]

Not for purposes of playing games here in the forums, of course. I'll leave that to other people.

I'm curious, because there are a few stories I have percolating that I'd rather not have mixed in with my other stories. As it is, the first series I wrote was a crazy idea based upon a conversation/joking around I did with my wife, and I ended up with something skewed towards a particular audience that I don't really relate to in any way. That makes it difficult for me to share my work with a few people I know and would like to, because I'm liable to get a wtf reaction. Of course, I seem to be unable to write stories that stay in a single category anyway. In fact, just as with my most recent story that is in the hopper, most often my stories seem to not want to fit into any articular one of them.

Anyone else have the same issues/thoughts?

 

[walkerlong]

I know some people do, but I don't see any reason for it. This site is just a crazy sandbox anyway.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I use different names; JBJ is trolled, the other isn't.

 

[lovecraft68]

There are authors who use more than one name to do just what you're mentioning; keeping different topics separate.

Thee first that comes to mind is Darkniciad who writes(and publicly he's not an "alt") under two other names. One is for stroke stories, one sci fi type things.

I myself do not, but I have considered it. I write a lot of incest and have one long series that is very dark and has a lot of depressing content.

The second name idea dawned on me when I wrote a mature romance that went over very well and I got a lot of comments saying "Can't wait to read your other stuff!"

And sure enough I saw a bunch of people fav then unfav me fairly quickly.

But at this point its probably not worth doing because I have a large fan base under this name and don't feel like starting over.

Plus I think there is something to be said for diversity and not all of your stories being the same.

I guess IMO if you're going to start a second name its best to do it early on.

 

[lovecraft68]

I know some people do, but I don't see any reason for it. This site is just a crazy sandbox anyway.

And like real sand boxes a lot of people pee in this one.

 

[MSTarot]

Thought about doing this when I first got started. Like LC, a few of my stories go down darker pathways.

It would be nice to have my other stories not have to be judged by the fact I was in a mood and wanted to write something dark. Some people don't like the shadows.

But then I guess they would not be reading me.

Plus I was told I couldn't use the name I wanted.

 

[lovecraft68]

Plus I was told I couldn't use the name I wanted.

I know I took Lovecraft68 before you got here.

Okay, true story, I was not really sure I wanted to put my stories up. My wife pushed me to do it(so go ahead everyone, you can blame her for this)

So she logged on and created this handle for me. She knows I am a diehard HPL fan, but didn't try just Lovecraft she tried with an ER at the end and it was taken so she just stuck the year I was born there.

But any time I would complain it's either "You could have done it yourself" and the classic. "Not my fault you're old."

 

[RejectReality]

Yep.

I started out with my main handle, Darkniciad, telling stories in my fantasy world.

When I started branching out, I wanted some division between those stories and the stuff set in the real world or other worlds, so I create LesLumens.

Should have done it before I started posting the LST3K series, Laresa's World stories, and my chapters of A Royal Sacrifice, but oh well.

Then again, Laresa's World was what really put me on the map.

Anyway, I had a lot of ideas that just wouldn't come together as fully fleshed-out stories, and I was curious as to how I'd do without name recognition, so I created this pen name and kept it secret from everyone but Laurel and a handful of other people for a couple of years. Got my data and a place to put those less-involved, but still fun stories.

It works for me, but you do need to understand that your readership will be split if you go with multiple pen names. You'll almost certainly gain more readers overall by having a single name.

If you only have a few stories that you don't want muddying the existing pool, it wouldn't be so bad. Creating a new name to isolate some Loving Wives stories from the rest of your work is a good example. You get to post the tales, and the crazies in LW don't get to 1-bomb every other story in your list.

 

[Seanathon]

I never thought of creating a second name, but now that I am trying to write in different categories for the Survivor contest I do worry that someone who loved an Incest or Romance short story will see my name, click on my Fetish story on furries and think, wtf?

 

[patientlee]

I have enough trouble getting people to read my stuff under one name. I'm not going to start over with a new one.

 

[_Lynn_]

I only have one name here on Lit anymore but I use different names for publishing.

 

[lovecraft68]

I only have one name here on Lit anymore but I use different names for publishing.

Same here, I have a female pen name on SW because it seemed the smart thing at the time and now its too late to extricate myself from it.

I have two names on amazon. One for all PI stuff and the other for the rest of my erotica.

 

[PennLady]

I have enough trouble getting people to read my stuff under one name. I'm not going to start over with a new one.

I've considered it, but I post on other sites as well and don't feel like having other accounts on all of those sites as well. I know I run a risk, occasionally, as LC said, of people not like things when I go outside my usual, but oh well.

 

[oggbashan]

Yes.

Most of my stories are as oggbashan but I created jeanne_d_artois as an experiment to try writing stories from a female point of view.

I admitted that I was also jeanne_d_artois on an April 1. Some people were annoyed that they hadn't realised that oggbashan and jeanne_d_artois were the same.

Although Jeanne's Laundry Tales have been reasonably popular, some of her stories are duds, just like some of oggbashan's. Perhaps for both pen names it is because some of the stories were experimental, but it can also be because my muses are fickle. I sometimes write stories that I should have thrown at the reject pile.

You will find links to oggbashan's stories and jeanne_d_artois' stories in both signatures.

When I was Jeanne and people weren't aware that Jeanne was oggbashan, she had some *interesting* emails from people purporting to be male. They hadn't read her profile even as it was then. They were decades younger than her declared age.

As an experiment it was interesting that Jeanne received a different response in feedback and PCs, but since I rarely write or post as Jeanne now her stories are usually ignored.

Edited for PS: When I as oggbashan won the Winter Holiday Contest 2013, I received several low votes on my older stories. Poor Jeanne simultaneously lost almost all her Hs.

 

[MichaelWest]

Writing is a hobby and I never gave any thought to marketing or branding. I think Lovecraft is correct in that a different name should be begun early and you should have a plan, I do not, I just write what I think of and submit what actually gets completed. Once I stumbled over the LW category and did it during a contest I found the troll/1-bomb foolishness,that argues for alternate names, but I just shut off votes, ignored the idiots and they evaporated. Everything I do is me, for good or ill, if you love one story and hate another, that is just part of the journey taken with me.

 

[RoyceConnors]

I just started writing under a female name late last year. I started writing erotica from a female POV and there was no way I could do it as Royce, so I created the new name to go with the stories I had written. So far, everything has gone red with H's and hundreds of comments have stated I'm a great female writer, so I guess I'm making it work.

 

[MSTarot]

I know I took Lovecraft68 before you got here.

Okay, true story, I was not really sure I wanted to put my stories up. My wife pushed me to do it(so go ahead everyone, you can blame her for this)

So she logged on and created this handle for me. She knows I am a diehard HPL fan, but didn't try just Lovecraft she tried with an ER at the end and it was taken so she just stuck the year I was born there.

But any time I would complain it's either "You could have done it yourself" and the classic. "Not my fault you're old."

Lovecraft-something-another might have been a choice but I saw you here and figured that people might think I was your Alt. I was writing so poorly when I started (yeah not like now huh ) I didn't want it to reflect on your work.

My first try was based on the name I used playing World of Warcraft. A truly fun gnome Death Night i worked up to do PvP.

I called him "EvilChilde." Not based on him being a kid (though the whole short gnome thing... anyway)

More along the lines of these definitions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childe


Nope can not use the world Childe as part of a name. It looks like a sneeky altered version of "child" and the site doesn't allow it.

So I went with my SCA name. Most people there know me as Muirghein Sebastian anyway. And the Tarot would only appear on documents with I have few of. Not a parchment hunter.

 

[lovecraft68]

Lovecraft-something-another might have been a choice but I saw you here and figured that people might think I was your Alt. I was writing so poorly when I started (yeah not like now huh ) I didn't want it to reflect on your work.

You need not have worried.

I reflect poorly enough on my work for it not to matter.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Yes...click the links in my sig.

 

[JKendallDane]

It works for me, but you do need to understand that your readership will be split if you go with multiple pen names. You'll almost certainly gain more readers overall by having a single name.

If you are only looking for one-shot views, multiple names may be okay. If you are more interested in developing a solid following that will also give you additional views of all your offerings, RR's comment makes the most sense.

Since I write gay male stories exclusively, it doesn't make much sense to have a second pen name anyway because it will all get laid out on the smorgasboard of GM by default. I've written everything from romance to cheating husbands and from one-night-stands to incest with negligible backlash from the fan base I've managed to build.

My first stories on Lit were originally published under another name starting back in 2009. That moniker didn't fit with where I wanted to take my writing so I resurrected this one that I first used in 1988. There are still a half dozen stories found under my original Lit name, but once I get through the current series that spawned itself from those strokers, I intend to ask Laurel to merge the two accounts.

 

[sr71plt]

Umm, under seven names, I think, plus two coauthor names. Not all used to post stories to Literotica, though.

 

[Euphony]

You need not have worried.

I reflect poorly enough on my work for it not to matter.

But, you see you would have peed in his punchbowl as well.

We allow you here LC only because we have a proper containment system in place for the, um, off gassing.

 

[Euphony]

On topic.

When I first got here, I thought multiple names/alts was rather silly but now knowing the lay of the land, I can see many instances where its not deception but survival.

As RR said, venture into LWives at your peril.

Also, even the most vanilla of commentors in the AH can attract the wrath of 1 bombers.

And, I can totally see it as a tool to keep the fun and enjoyment of an authors stories for a certain section of his/her readership. (some are fluffy bunnies who scare easily. Moi aussi.)

The more bipolar your offerings, the more I think it makes sense.

Or if you like to provoke shit in the AH and yet still care about your scores.

 

[StrangeLife]

Yeah - "StrangeLife" and "Stephenie Meyer"....

 

[lovecraft68]

Yeah - "StrangeLife" and "Stephenie Meyer"....

Dear Stephanie,

When are you going to write a new series? I need something else to steal

sincerely,

E.L. James.