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Writer's Block: Where Names Come From
[Error: unknown template qotd]There's no real mystery to "Erastes" - I simply wanted a penname which described what I wrote, and I thought Erastes would "do exactly what it said on the tin" - e.g. people would even know what it was, or might go and look it up. Being the name for the top in a Greek relationship might give a clue. Even though Greek men are called that even now, but I think it's in the same way that English girls are being called Clymidia or Chardonnay.
I do admit to choosing a gender neutral or a masculine name - and (probably mistakenly) putting my bio up as male for a while, but I always admitted I was female if anyone wrote to me saying "dear sir..."! I really didn't think that it would be an issue - it isn't in ANY other genre, just about, so I (naively) thought it would be OK in m/m. However I learned differently and now state that I'm female out front.
As to my real name - which I'm not prepared to give out - I was named after my godmother who was French, both in my first name and my second name which I tell no-one.
If I'd been a boy, I would have been Hayden Maxwell [surname] which would have been really cool.
I do admit to choosing a gender neutral or a masculine name - and (probably mistakenly) putting my bio up as male for a while, but I always admitted I was female if anyone wrote to me saying "dear sir..."! I really didn't think that it would be an issue - it isn't in ANY other genre, just about, so I (naively) thought it would be OK in m/m. However I learned differently and now state that I'm female out front.
As to my real name - which I'm not prepared to give out - I was named after my godmother who was French, both in my first name and my second name which I tell no-one.
If I'd been a boy, I would have been Hayden Maxwell [surname] which would have been really cool.
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It was torquere, really - they wanted a bio from me when they published my first short story and I said "do i have to say I'm a woman?" and they said "No, you can say you are anything" so I did. However, now of course, they've had a big problem with their author / owners writing and publishing their own books under many different pennames, so I realise now that perhaps I should have checked with someone else first, but what did I know, back then?