Back when Sunshine Walkingstick popped into my head in September 2014, I seriously considered publishing her stories under my first pen name, Lucy Varna.

Two years later, when the first Sunny novel was published, I decided that her stories were dissimilar enough from the Lucy Varna stories that I should publish them separately. Thus was the Celia Roman pen name born.

Over the past few years, I've rethought that decision, often with a twinge of regret.

How much farther along would I be if I'd nurtured that one pen name instead of scattering my focus so wildly?

No matter how many times I ask myself that question, the answer is always a lot.

This is one of those things that can't be undone. I can't have a do-over, I have no idea how to merge the pen names, and I'm not sure that I would even if I could. Which one would I pick anyway? Would I discard Lucy Varna, my first and favorite pen name, the one whose books taught me how to write fiction? Or would I discard Celia Roman, which has a far larger and more loyal audience?

That's not even accounting for the expense involved in consolidating the two.

The truth is that I don't want to give either one up. I want to keep them both and I want to produce books for both audiences on a consistent basis.

Given that, I've also considered co-writing stories as these two separate identies and having both Celia Roman and Lucy Varna appear as the authors. Readers would know it's all the same person. Honestly, the kinds of stories written under both names are similar enough that I could maybe get away with this.

The SciFi Romance being the exception, of course, but that opens up a whole nother can of worms.

If I had a do-over, I'd publish Sunny under the Lucy Varna name.

Since I can't, and since I don't want to discard either name, the best solution may really be co-authoring some stories together down the road.