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Two reasons I know of: Personal - some people are exceptionally private, especially in this day and age, and would like to remain so in their personal lives. Professional - much like other artists, authors can be tied to a specific style of writing or genre. Existing fans can be upset if an author experiments in another genre, and new fans can't be picked ...

There are different levels of editing which are lumped together under the same term, which might be what's confusing you. "Syntax glitches and spelling" is line editing, aka proofreading, sometimes called copyediting. Similar to this is fact-checking, where the editor is looking up anything based in reality or researching anything made up for plausibility. ...

Yes, at least you can in the United States. If you write under a pseudonym and do not want to have your identity revealed in the Copyright Office’s records, give your pseudonym and identify it as such on your application. You can leave blank the space for the name of the author. Reference: U.S. Copyright Office - Pseudonyms

Also: there are two ways you can indicate your pseudonym with the Copyright Office. You can either use just your pseudonym or you can use your real name and indicate you are "writing as pen name." Using the pseudonym as the copyright claimant can pose potential legal problems should such issues arise, so the Copyright Office rightly suggest that if you go ...

Sometimes pen names are used to fit with an imaginary "true story". A great example is The Princess Bride, in which the real author (William Goldman) pretends it's a "true story" written by someone of the era (S. Morgenstern). Still, that falls under Marketing I guess. Another reason is that an author may want to be shelved with other authors of their ...

Zane hit the main ones: desire for personal privacy the other primary reason I know is marketing - same as actors, some authors will adopt snazzier-sounding names to sound good on the bookshelf. Beyond that, you've got a lot of exceptional cases - Joe Hill is a pen name to avoid the otherwise-painfully-blatant connection to his father; Alice Bradley Sheldon ...

We're the ones who take your manuscript and make sure you've succeeded in getting an idea from your head onto the paper. We look for plot holes, grammar mistakes, and things that just don't make sense. Any good editor also knows what sells. They will offer suggestions and advice on parts of your book that a majority of readers may not like. They'll look for ...

One unusual reason I haven't seen touched on: Some people do it to access a side of them that they want to express, creating a kind of virtual "person" with different attributes. Some people call it their "muse" and other pet names. It's a way of allowing themselves to overcome some mental barrier by pretending to be someone else, with special "powers", ...

Women writers used to do it because only men authors were taken seriously. Sometimes people don't want the fame from their writing they just want to do it for the art. The pen name allows them peace from the hype of their book. Sometimes people are afraid of critics and feel better if its not actually their name being bashed it makes it feel less personal.

I would check with the publishers. As a general rule though if you will be listed as co-author then the correct form is usually "we"(If you are contracted to re-write it but it will be published only under the original title and author, you would say "I".) The final decision is usually the publishers'.

Of the Brontë sisters' motivation to use pseudonyms Wikipedia has to say: In 1846, the sisters' poems were published in one volume as Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. The Brontë sisters had adopted pseudonyms for publication: Charlotte was Currer Bell, Emily was Ellis Bell and Anne was Acton Bell. Charlotte wrote in the "Biographical ...

To answer your specific question about Seanan/Mira, see http://seananmcguire.com/writefaq.php#mira. In her case, she's using different names for urban fantasy vs science fiction. There's also the classic midlist death spiral--author doesn't sell enough, publisher drops them, author changes name so they can sell new books.