Two pseudonyms? Yes, I agree, it's a bit much. But there is an explanation - well, there are two...
When I moved to Spain (2006) to teach Spanish junior children their entire UK National Curriculum in English, I thought - this is crackers, there are going to be some stories to tell here. Within a couple of weeks, I knew I was right. The children's level of English was much lower than I'd anticipated, leaving me with countless incidents of confusion and linguistic mayhem. The head had told me on interview that the 7-year-old Spaniards in my class were 'fluent' in English. I later decided I'd misheard, he must've said 'effluent'. I decided I'd pen a few columns and send them off to the Times Educational Supplement to see if they'd bite - they did.
I told them I'd like to use a pseudonym, not being sure whether the columns would turn into an exposé as the mayhem seemed to get worse by the week, and started to include the 'management'. The TES agreed. So I spent a happy few days playing with some names that might give me a suitably 'undercover' and 'intelligent' persona: Saint Michael, perhaps? Or Maestro Raúl Casanova? Then, late one Thursday evening, I got an email from the editor telling me I was in the next day's mag and they hoped I'd like my pseudonym - Jeremy Dean. Ho hum. I added José as a 'classy' middle name later, when I published my first book, which included many of the TES articles:
Having written a couple of (what I call) my school 'memoirs', I decided to try fiction next. A novel. A story with a beginning, a middle and an end - as we coach the children. I was also looking forward to a chance to publish under my 'real' name. So, I wrote Hitting the Jackpot and was offered a contract by Bloodhound Books - but there was one small snag - they wanted me to use a pseudonym: a different one. Their argument was that a shorter, 'snappier' name than the one I possess in real life (Alan Joseph Thompson) would be more appropriate for the genre of Hitting the Jackpot (a romcom). They also said that a 'good name' could add to sales (not that they thought there was anything 'wrong' with my real name...)
They proposed Tom Alan, but were open to suggestions. My family were full of them. Joe Alan, A J Thomas (that from a JK Rowling fangirl) and even Al Fresco. I went with Tom Alan in the end, probably due to my instinct to trust 'experts' and a fear that if sales were poor I would spend the rest of my life regretting the fact that I hadn't trusted the publisher's choice.
When my second novel (The Last App) was accepted, I did wonder if Bloodhound would suggest yet another pseudonym, as the genre was very different from the first. But, no. They were happy for me to continue as Tom Alan. Phew! Keeping track of three sets of passwords for Facebook, Twitter and the rest would have been a nightmare.
So, two pseudonyms - that's got to be cooler than one, we shall see how far they take me...
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