‘The history of literature is well populated with women who either used men’s names or fudged it with some androgynous initials. Even some female authors that are household names today were first published under masculine pseudonyms: the Brontë sisters, Charlotte, Emily, and Anne, were first published as Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. Others continue to be recognised by their pen names, like Middlemarch author George Eliot, known to her friends as Mary Ann Evans. These women chose male pseudonyms because it was felt they could not otherwise be taken seriously by readers… It’s a sad reality that while women generally don’t discriminate in their reading, men are more prone to foolishly pass female writers by.’
Haylen Beck (a pseudonym), PowellsBooksBlog