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lydamorehouseNormally cleaning a fish tank makes the fish better. Not in the case of our upstairs hospital/plague tank. I had read that the “Ick” virus lives in the substrate, but it never occurred to me that regular maintenance of the tank would stir up the little buggers to badly as to take out nearly all ten tetra in a single blow. Currently, there are two survivors (technically there are supposed to be three, but as I haven’t seen tetra3 in a while, I suspect he’s belly up underneath the pagoda feature.)
Insane.
Even Dip (the gourami) has developed spots on his fins. So, my current plan is to wait out this disaster and then completely scrap this tank and “do over.”
At least I can report that the goldfish and the shrimp downstairs are happy and alive. In fact, the goldfish seem happy enough that they seem very, uh, amorous. More on that -- if it develops.
Anyway, Rachel asked me about my relationship with my pseudonym so I thought I’d talk about that a little (though I don’t know exactly what she wants to know, Goddess knows that’s never stopped me from expounding about anything before.)
For those of you who don’t know the history, it goes like this. I wrote a bunch of science fiction books that won some awards but didn’t sell enough copies to make me an attractive author for Roc. I should say that my books sold relatively well, actually, but just not _enough._.
Also, I was “orphaned” (twice, actually, but I’ll get to that.)
What “orphaned” means in the publishing business is that the editor who was enthused enough about my work to dig me out of the slush pile (or, rather, pile of agents manuscripts) to buy me left Roc to go do other things (in her case write her own novels). For many authors this alone can spell disaster. Think about it, you’ve just lost your advocate. If your new editor doesn’t much care for your work or your style (or even more likely, never has much of a chance to catch up on your “backlist”) they’re not going to go out of their way to make the very best deals for you when it comes to advertising, etc.
Now, I lucked out. My new editor and I really, REALLY hit it off. In fact, even though he orphaned me, too, we’re still friends. He was also something really very rare in this business: honest. He told me that my publisher was done with me while there was still time to salvage some things, most notably my career. When I was particularly frustrated one day, I called him up (I could do that with this guy) and said, “What’s a girl got to do to make it in this town?” He told me to write a vampire book. I told him I could do that with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back. He said, “prove it.” So, I wrote him a proposal, which he liked enough that he asked me if I’d be willing to substitute the novel I was supposed to be writing under contract for the “new” one. I didn’t much like the novel I was writing, especially since I knew that the publisher wasn’t excited about it and that they’d probably do absolutely no promotion for it, so I said yes.
Smartest thing I’ve done in a long time, that.
That’s how Tate Hallaway was born. As for my “relationship” with her, it’s mostly an open secret. I talk about her on this blog and on www.lydamorehouse.com -- but I don’t talk about who I am when I’m pretending to be her. You will only find veiled references to me as me on Tate’s blog and I’m not mentioned at all on her web site. Why? Well, the main reason I took on another name was to escape bad sales figures. Big box bookstores often make their buying decisions based on how many books they sold by that author previously, and then they cut that number in half for the next book. They don’t care if the author has changed genres or is starting a different series, they just track the name (or at least that’s the prevailing wisdom.)
The idea was to mostly keep my name and her name as separate as possible from people who weren’t going to work terribly hard to put two and two together. I keep me off the Tate pages because most of the people coming there aren’t looking for Lyda’s backlist, they’re looking to find out what’s NEW from Tate. If any of Tate’s fans make a guess as to my alternate identity, I offer to send gratis copies of my tetrology. (I’m a big believer in the power of the “give-away.”)
However, I point the fans of my work to Tate’s because currently there’s not much to be had under my name. Some day, perhaps even next year when Mason starts attending pre-K, I hope to attempt to write two novels in a year, which means I may write a “Morehouse” book for a smaller press (I’ve had some interest from Bold Stokes Books, though I’ve kind of dropped the ball with them and that interest may have dried up.) My agent, however, believes that SF will come back into style and I can eventually sell more SF under my name to a big press. Either way, I’m confident that I’ll write more SF novels as Lyda Morehouse. I also continue to write short SF/F/H pieces under my name with the hope that I won’t completely fall off the SF/F radar.
When I go to SF conventions, I go as Lyda. When I go to Tate signings/readings, I go as Tate. My publisher has never asked me to pretend to be a straight girl when I do Tate events, but I think it’s kind of hilarious and I love to play dress-up, so I do it. I’m enough of an ex-theatre geek that I love the idea of playing pretend, and have envisioned all sorts of silly things to do – like go to WisCon as Tate and Lyda and then pretend to have a big falling out with my other personality… etc. This is just my own craziness, though. No one has ever asked me to be anything other than myself in public.
Does that answer your question?
Insane.
Even Dip (the gourami) has developed spots on his fins. So, my current plan is to wait out this disaster and then completely scrap this tank and “do over.”
At least I can report that the goldfish and the shrimp downstairs are happy and alive. In fact, the goldfish seem happy enough that they seem very, uh, amorous. More on that -- if it develops.
Anyway, Rachel asked me about my relationship with my pseudonym so I thought I’d talk about that a little (though I don’t know exactly what she wants to know, Goddess knows that’s never stopped me from expounding about anything before.)
For those of you who don’t know the history, it goes like this. I wrote a bunch of science fiction books that won some awards but didn’t sell enough copies to make me an attractive author for Roc. I should say that my books sold relatively well, actually, but just not _enough._.
Also, I was “orphaned” (twice, actually, but I’ll get to that.)
What “orphaned” means in the publishing business is that the editor who was enthused enough about my work to dig me out of the slush pile (or, rather, pile of agents manuscripts) to buy me left Roc to go do other things (in her case write her own novels). For many authors this alone can spell disaster. Think about it, you’ve just lost your advocate. If your new editor doesn’t much care for your work or your style (or even more likely, never has much of a chance to catch up on your “backlist”) they’re not going to go out of their way to make the very best deals for you when it comes to advertising, etc.
Now, I lucked out. My new editor and I really, REALLY hit it off. In fact, even though he orphaned me, too, we’re still friends. He was also something really very rare in this business: honest. He told me that my publisher was done with me while there was still time to salvage some things, most notably my career. When I was particularly frustrated one day, I called him up (I could do that with this guy) and said, “What’s a girl got to do to make it in this town?” He told me to write a vampire book. I told him I could do that with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back. He said, “prove it.” So, I wrote him a proposal, which he liked enough that he asked me if I’d be willing to substitute the novel I was supposed to be writing under contract for the “new” one. I didn’t much like the novel I was writing, especially since I knew that the publisher wasn’t excited about it and that they’d probably do absolutely no promotion for it, so I said yes.
Smartest thing I’ve done in a long time, that.
That’s how Tate Hallaway was born. As for my “relationship” with her, it’s mostly an open secret. I talk about her on this blog and on www.lydamorehouse.com -- but I don’t talk about who I am when I’m pretending to be her. You will only find veiled references to me as me on Tate’s blog and I’m not mentioned at all on her web site. Why? Well, the main reason I took on another name was to escape bad sales figures. Big box bookstores often make their buying decisions based on how many books they sold by that author previously, and then they cut that number in half for the next book. They don’t care if the author has changed genres or is starting a different series, they just track the name (or at least that’s the prevailing wisdom.)
The idea was to mostly keep my name and her name as separate as possible from people who weren’t going to work terribly hard to put two and two together. I keep me off the Tate pages because most of the people coming there aren’t looking for Lyda’s backlist, they’re looking to find out what’s NEW from Tate. If any of Tate’s fans make a guess as to my alternate identity, I offer to send gratis copies of my tetrology. (I’m a big believer in the power of the “give-away.”)
However, I point the fans of my work to Tate’s because currently there’s not much to be had under my name. Some day, perhaps even next year when Mason starts attending pre-K, I hope to attempt to write two novels in a year, which means I may write a “Morehouse” book for a smaller press (I’ve had some interest from Bold Stokes Books, though I’ve kind of dropped the ball with them and that interest may have dried up.) My agent, however, believes that SF will come back into style and I can eventually sell more SF under my name to a big press. Either way, I’m confident that I’ll write more SF novels as Lyda Morehouse. I also continue to write short SF/F/H pieces under my name with the hope that I won’t completely fall off the SF/F radar.
When I go to SF conventions, I go as Lyda. When I go to Tate signings/readings, I go as Tate. My publisher has never asked me to pretend to be a straight girl when I do Tate events, but I think it’s kind of hilarious and I love to play dress-up, so I do it. I’m enough of an ex-theatre geek that I love the idea of playing pretend, and have envisioned all sorts of silly things to do – like go to WisCon as Tate and Lyda and then pretend to have a big falling out with my other personality… etc. This is just my own craziness, though. No one has ever asked me to be anything other than myself in public.
Does that answer your question?
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no subject
Date: 2007-02-08 06:49 pm (UTC)It brings up other questions, though... Have fans ever complained of being "deceived"? What about when you go to a signing and someone addresses you as Lyda? How developed is Tate as a person? (How close does it come to multiple personality disorder?) The publisher knows that Tate is a pseudonym, right?
Hmm, those questions sound very clinical. Sorry, it really is very interesting. And I do hope you publish more under your name. (Still haven't worked my way through the Archangel Protocol series, but I'm a very slow reader.)
More answers
Date: 2007-02-08 07:17 pm (UTC)No one has ever complained for being deceived. As I said, it's an open secret and MY copyright appears in the copyright information in all of Tate's books. (If you're ever curious if someone is writing under a psuedonym that's a good place to check -- the author doesn't have to reveal their True Self there, but many do.)
Tate only exists on-line. Like I said, I dress up as her for conventions, but most people know I'm "being" Tate. I don't really tell any lies about myself when I'm being Tate on-line either. I mention my partner Shawn (if it is germaine to a blog) and my son Mason. I tell stories about myself, just under Tate's by-line, as it were.
There's just one new weird wrinkle in all that -- which is that in the British version of Tall, Dark & Dead my bio lists my hometown as LaCrosse, Wisconsin, which it is not. I grew up there, but I was born in Sacramento, California. I suspect the publisher wanted the change so that the whole concept of a Wisconsinite writing about Wisconsin would have that certain cache. It's the only time I've been asked to lie, however, and I could have said no.
As for whether the publisher knows that Lyda Morehouse is Tate -- Honey, the publisher HAS to know. They have to send the check to ME, after all. :-)
Re: More answers
Date: 2007-02-08 11:48 pm (UTC)Duh, I should've figured that out.
Thanks for all the answers!
Re: More answers
Date: 2007-02-09 01:31 am (UTC)But there is the whole contract thing.
Revivifying
Date: 2007-02-08 08:00 pm (UTC)Appropriate choice of genre to write in during the interim, then, no?
Tate is a lot of fun ...
Date: 2007-02-08 11:01 pm (UTC)And, we bought several of Lyda's books, as well as Tate's first, at that con ... because anyone who can play with identities so adeptly just deserves to sell books (and because we like both genres & now, both authors).
Go for it, whoever you will be ...
no subject
Date: 2007-02-09 06:25 pm (UTC)Not Everyone Knows . . .
Date: 2007-02-10 04:35 pm (UTC)As he told me, Rambles reviews quite a bit of vampire-chick-lit and will put Tall, Dark, and Dead into their schedule.
On another note, someone went from my blog to my book reviews and then to me through a chat program. She asked me about HER book and I said that if she wanted to buy it, I could probably get it signed for her. What's the logistics of getting that done?
- CV Rick cvrick.typepad.com
Re: Not Everyone Knows . . .
Date: 2007-02-12 05:51 pm (UTC)As for the rest, I read the first review in Rambles, I had no idea he'd reviewed the others. Cool! Thank you for outing me to Tom.
Update
Date: 2007-02-11 02:11 am (UTC)PS: I think it's cool that you actually "create" someone else for your pen name. I think that shows a lot of dedication and that you're really serious about your craft.
-Mel