Why the name

Back in the days before newspaper comment sections, blogging, or whatever social media there is now for people to express their opinions, I would write letters to the editor of our local paper. Admittedly I was hoping someone from the Washington Post or New York Times would notice me and say, "Hey here's the next (insert your favorite opinion writer here)." Silly me. After about the fifth letter, Mrs. Stidmon and I had a sit down. When we have a sit down its usually me sitting and her giving me the what for.

Basically my dreams of becoming a famous opinion writer were being over shadowed by the various calls from people with reaction to the letters. Most were in some level of agreement but a few people actually called to "disagree" with me. Some left messages on the answering machine. It were those calls that Mrs. Stidmon was talking about, especially when the little Stidmons over heard the calls and became frighten. I stopped writing to the local newspaper.

I did not stop writing though. And when I finally finished my first book back in 2004 I was faced with a dilemma. What if I became famous? Okay, stop laughing, I did not realize back then that one had a better chance at winning the PowerBall lottery versus becoming a famous writer. But hey, what if? I did not want to subject my family to the paparazzi and those pesky phone calls. (Do famous writers actually have paparazzi following them?) Anyways, I wanted to use a pen name to separate my personal, actual, life from this fantasy dream of being a mega super star author. Thus the need for a pen name.

Pen names are cool. They are a way to be someone that you aren't. And you can separate yourself from one life from another. So then the question I faced was what would mine be. That's not so easy because a pen name should be cool and author sounding such as Mark Twain or Richard Bachman or George Orwell. I did not want to totally disassociate from my surname. In a way I did not want to say, "No really I'm George Mason the super duper famous writer." Or have to explain to a dear older relative that, "yes I was on Jay Leno I was just using a different name." Then there was the issue of friends or family coming up to me and saying, "I was trying to find your book but could not find it under Slartibartfast. How do you spell that?"  Stidmon would have to stick.

Then the question became after deciding that I was going to stick with my last name, what about the first name. I could sound authoritative like Cecil B. De Mills and be Michael L. Stidmon. That would not due. For one I would probably get a lot of phone calls from people "disagreeing" with me. Besides, that's who I am to the world in my personal life. Then there was going with Mike Stidmon. Really, here I am wanting to eventually write a high epic fantasy story that Peter Jackson might salivate over wanting to make a movie trilogy from. Mike just did not sound like JRR or JK or George RR. Besides, Mike is that guy who works at the facility. You know, "Hey Mike, go do X."

Speaking of the facility where I work a day job, I have to log on to a computer and yep you guess it, my name comes up as ML Stidmon. One day after some time of pondering what name I should use as an author I was logging on at work and there it struck me. I would be ML Stidmon, hopefully super duper, incredibly famous after one book, author. That was back in 2004.

When the book Thomas Monroe and the Greggs of Kesselt was published by my former publishers I went by ML Stidmon. I have stuck to that as my pen name.

Now for something completely different. I was recently googling my self. I like to do that on occasion. I like to see what I have been up to. Sometimes the stuff on the net is more interesting than what's happening in real life. I can hardly wait to read about how I am divorcing my well known 30 something A list movie star for some up and coming graduate from kid's cable network TV starlet. Anyways, sometime ago during my Great Grandfather's day the surname went from Stedman to Stidmon. My whole life I have been fighting misspellings. So I was googling ML Stedman in case some schmuck once again misspelled name. And low and behold I found out I was a well known author from Australia who wrote a successful book titled Light Between the Oceans. And published by Simon and Schuster. (Sure, those guys wouldn't touch the equally captivating and hopefully having Peter Jackson calling to make a trilogy out of Thomas Monroe and the Greggs of Kesselt; but here they were publishing Ms. Stedman's book.)

Really? There's two of us?  Great, one day she'll be on the Graham Norton show and then to confuse the audience I'll be on it the next time. Or I could be the fill in when Ms. Stedman wont be able to join Jay, Dave, Jimmy, Cullen, or Conan.

Seriously, I wish nothing but the best for M.L. Stedman and her works. I have not read her writings but I am sure they are top notch having been published by Simon and Schuster. They are know to be a little picky on the caliber of writing from authors.

However, I was ML Stidmon first back in December of 2004. So there.