This blog post comes to you courtesy of Ink-Stained-Wordsmiths this week’s prompt “identity”, combined with the group discussions of new beginnings and/or introducing yourself.

While I’ve not sought to publicize it in every discussion, neither is it a secret that I’m writing under a penname. Laura Maybrooke. Why did I choose to do so, and who am I under my assumed identity?

As many of those who’ve befriended me over at Twitter know, I live in a little Northern European country. My country has two official languages, and English is neither of them. My Northern European, Nordic country, also boasts a lot of surnames that to the English speaking world sound strange and difficult to pronounce. Our alphabet includes such letters as å, ä ,ö.

My real first name is and always has been Laura; let’s get that out of the way. I’m glad my parents chose such an international name for me, and it’s come handy as I’ve worked all my adult life in professions where I’m constantly speaking English with others, either with native speakers or with other foreigners.

Publishing a book (or a few) has been a long-time dream of mine. My current dark high fantasy romance series is a product of the past 25 years of writing. In 2019, when Immortal Defiance came out, I faced the difficult decision of what to call myself.

I knew for certain I would not publish under my real life. My target audience is English-speaking and I have no desire or intention of writing in any other language. I feared, should I have gone with my real name, that people would have found me one (or both) of two things:

• My real name difficult to pronounce
• See I was a self-published non-native speaker and choose someone else over me

I’m now glad to publicize the above to any and all because mostly I’ve received only kind words on my use of English, and many have been surprised to learn English is not my first language.

Still, let me keep my real name to myself!

Is Laura Maybrooke then me, or is she a part of my persona?

I would say she is me. I am her. Other than my different surname, I am not putting an act for anyone. My identity is the same, whether you’re calling me Laura Maybrooke or Laura Ma…something.

We are both accountants by profession, wives and moms, we love to paint and share artwork. Grew up in the 80s’ and 90s, remember a time before the internet, and proper computers. We’ve always been gamer girls, loved such acronyms as (a)D&D and LARP, and remember when it was an odd time for girls to do any of that.

My penname is exactly who I am in real life; the only thing separating us is the surname. We share one identity, one mind, one body.