The ballad of Pinky McSparkles

I love Twitter. Can I just get that out of the way first? I interact with a number of people who are creative in various ways, and who sift through my crazy ramblings and sometimes reply to my outbursts in unpredictable and awesome ways.

The other day, I was rambling about how if I took up a pen name, I’d want to make sure that my alter ego was a kids book wuss of a creampuff author. So if she came back from the dead, as with George Stark, no way could she be tough enough to kill anyone, much less everyone I knew. This led to me briefly talking about why I don’t have a pen name, but I commented that I had thought about it. I had decided that I might do it, but only if I came up with a book so different that it demanded a pen name.

Well along come @CrookedFang to suggest helpfully that I should take the pen name Pinky McSparkles. And I went to tell hubby and he laughed loud and long. I laughed with him, almost until tears came out. What a brilliant name. It even tells you what kind of story she should write, some kids fantasy story about unicorns and rainbows and…

“And zombies,” said @Alpharalpha. More specifically he wrote:

Pinky McSparkles and the zombie apocalypse = want

So now there’s this idea flying out there, with added spin, and it’s just begging “Take a swing at me!”

And then, after I lamented that I’d have to hire someone to impersonate Pinky for the book signings with the kids, @Polerin volunteered to take on the role of Pinky. @Polerin is active in roller derby, and I thought, “Well, if Pinky McSparkles is supposed to survive a zombie apocalypse, she’d best be a roller derby girl.”

So here you have a possible plan that I may, or may not pursue. I mean, Pink McSparkles is an awesome name, but it demands a certain kind of story, a kind of sugary voice that exudes good cheer and rainbows. And sparkles. Can’t forget those. Right now, I don’t have anything that would fit her style, not even an inkling of a premise. But it IS a rather good pen name, and wouldn’t it be ironic if I sold a book under a new name and it sold a billion copies?

So I’ve got this whimpering request sent up to my muse: “Please, at some point, come up with a cute kids fantasy story worthy of the pen name Pinky McSparkles.”