Pen Name

As I work toward a career in romance writing, my recent consideration has been a pen name. Long ago, in the times of my angsty teen years, I created my cmkerwin pen name. Only it was C.M. Kerwin, Kerwin being the last name of an actor named James Kerwin who played a character on a show titled James at 15, and the first two initials referring to my name at that time. I thought it clever but, alas, never had a need to use it

Then the electronic age came rushing in and I needed a username for everything under the sun. Tada! I pulled out C.M. Kerwin from under the bed, dusted it off, changed it to cmkerwin and it became my identity on social media.

The only issue I incurred came from an aunt of a guy named Chris Kerwin. This aunt kept emailing her nephew Chris little notes and gift cards on his birthday to my email address. This was not long after my Ebay hacking, and so I deleted her emails sure she was a scammer out to lure me to open up these gift card links, which I didn't even feel right about because I wasn't the said recipient. I had some twinges about Chris not writing a thank you note, but I figured it would all get straightened out at their next family reunion. Apparently, it didn't. I continued receiving the occasional email from Aunt Toto until one day her email came informing Chris of the death of his uncle. UH...

I emailed her back, fussed up to not being Chris, expressed my sorrow for her loss, and then crossed my fingers she wasn't a scammer out to destroy my precious cmkerwin email that I loved so very much. She responded with a big thank you and that was the end of that. My handle, my pen name, my username was once again mine.

When I decided to pursue the romance writing angle, I immediately figured I'd use cmkerwin as my pen name because it is my pen name and has been for oh, so very long. It is my identity! It is me. Now was my moment to make it worldwide. Only after using it for the first time in a contest that I recently found out I won (yeah me!), C.M. Kerwin didn't look all that spiffy on the winners' sheet.

It could be that a creative font is all I need but now that I've seen it in print C.M. isn't exactly a romantic name. Suddenly, in addition to coming up with names for characters, I'm on the hunt for a pen name. As creative as I am in storytelling and writing romance plots, things like titles and pen names are not my forte, and the person that I usually use for these sort of things is currently off the grid where I am concerned so I'm on my own.

Choosing this is more personal than I thought. It's like the time at the social security office when I had to change my name to my married name. Then it was losing a piece of me. Now its adding a piece of me.

I could go with my maiden name. Or I could use that Facebook generator that gives your stripper name using letters from your name or some such nonsense, but something tells me Sugar Glitter Kiss isn't going to cut it any more than C.M. Kerwin. I thought Darcy Madison. Personal, a twist I thought quite clever, but the more I contemplated it the more I realized that I wanted this to be about me for a change and not about my kids. Sorry girls.

The hunt reminds me of a teenage girl combining her first name and the last name of her crush on her school's notebook. I still have some of the notebooks that read Cara Anderson, but I can't even go with that one because it's the last name of my daughter's boy toy! I chucked it immediately out of the consideration pile like I did all of the baby names my husband made fun of while trying to name our first child.

Currently, I'm going through family names. As a kid our elders' names were so, well old, and we rolled our eyes at their names, but I'm finding myself gravitating to them now. Ruby is romantic. I could get behind that one, but what to pair it with? I turned to Google. Articles on the subject range from using your favorite singer to your favorite drink. Ruby Keith? Ruby Rum? One generator that I used asked me questions such as my pet's first name and a street I lived on. That generated Amos Ash. Yep. Nope.

In my phone, I've jotted down names that I hear in my daily life that catch my ear, but those have already conjured up characters in my mind, belonged to those heroines, and thus, are off the table. Now I've started a list for my pen name. Just like I did when trying to name that baby once in my womb. Like that time, I guess I'll narrow it down and choose, but right now it's just another procrastination.

If anyone out there has a suggestion, please let me know. If I chose it I will send you a free copy of the book that it appears on. Of course, I have to finish said book first, find an agent, and an editor, and a publisher and sell the darn thing, but please know that if it ever gets to print a copy is yours for the taking!