T.A. Barron: Hello, my name is T. A. Barron. Why am I called T. A. instead of Tom, as I've been known my whole life? Well, the truth is it was just an accident. One of those quirky unexpected twists in life. You see, I wrote my first novel while a student at Oxford, where the English always use their initials. Even though that book had, I guess you could say, a great reception, it got rejected by over 30 publishers. I kept on using T. A. on my manuscripts just out of habit. Nobody was more surprised than me when I saw that name on the cover of my first published book. So, I resign myself to being Tom Barron when I'm a regular human being and T. A. Barron when I'm a writer.