If I could get paid to write a book, yep, I'd have no problem doing it incognito. I like my privacy. I'd be more likely to do it incognito than put my name on it, if it was likely to happen at all.

Out of us internet users here, how many of us are using our real names on every post we make? Everything we do with our netnames, until we give out our real names, is incognito.

Race, gender, ethnicity, everything except dyslexia can be kept incognito

Dunno about Shakespeare though. I thought the Mona Lisa did it.

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Mallanox : "My mother was Irish and my father was an alien. I was an only child and I dress funny."

It 17th century up til I believe Victorian times Women writing literature (books) was frowned upon. You were seen as a blue stocking and therefore not suitable wife material. Hence this is why they wrote under pseudonyms.

Likewise as a male you were expected to be manly so if I guy wrote a romance novel it tended to be under a female name so the book sold.

Ghost writers these days can make a decent amount of money assisting in writing chapters of a book (this is what it tends to be rather than the whole thing) They work from an authors chapter plan and go from there.

As they tend to write just the chapter rather than the whole thing the book remains under the authors name.

Some people just dont like the limelight so are happy to write this way. If they change how they feel they tend to go on and start writing their own works.

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Like the Phoenix I rise from the fire. Beware all who try to tame me, you may get burned

Several print authors use pen names when they're branching out into other types of work.

Sometimes it's because of the material -- the 17C concerns as a above. They don't want their neighbours associating them with the wrong material.

Sometimes it's because they don't want to be stereotyped under their real name -- do the Controverisial Montly for money under one name, and keep the real name for their legit stuff. Be a fresh name for the publisher to evaluate, rather than someone who can only write whatever.

Other times it's because they already have been stereotyped one way, and want to try a different style. If you don't like the romances written by Jennifer, you're less likely to try her sci fi stuff, even if she's using a different style. Alisa Craig/Charlotte MacLeod writes different series under different names -- Alisa Craig is slightly sillier, if that's possible.

And then there's good old-fashioned privacy. They don't want to live in the limelight. But, that only works until your first book tour.

I know when I started fanfic, I was pretty sure that I'd keep one name for the "true to canon" stuff (well, true to the way canon made me feel), and, if I ever wrote more risque or darker, use a variation -- as a warning to the reader rather than a way to hide. There's only one of me, and most people will sort it out despite aliases. Then I learned about warning labels and such.

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Between stimulus and response there is a space.
In that space is our power to choose our response.
In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

- Viktor E. Frankl

I've thought often about this issue.

Considering I live in the Bible Belt, where Religion and Social Politics run roughshod, if I were to publish, I would most likely do it under a pen-name. While I believe it is important to understand the vast difference between what children should be exposed to, and what adults may choose to be exposed to. Most of my neighbors wouldn't believe that I value that difference if I publish a violent erotic novella about a love affair between two assassins, say. Or any number of other books I would care to write about. The results would be akin to a homosexual soldier admitting his preference to his commanding officer. He'd be drummed out of the military before the words finished leaving his mouth.

Another reason I might go for anonymity is demographics. I know a favorite author of mine, P.N. Elrod, writes hardboiled vampire detective novels. She doesn't use her whole name on her books because 'men won't be inclined to read her books if they knew immediately that she was a woman'. She'd cut her new reader base down significantly if she used her real name. Of course the same could be said of new authors no matter what gender/race/religion/etc. It is just a smart marketing move if you are writing in a genre that leans more towards a demographic not your own.

Then there is Meridian's reason. I am very protective of my privacy and just generally protecting what's mine.

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"Spider sense....tingling."