I found this article titled “Homme de Plume: What I learned Sending My Novel Out Under a Male Name” by Catherine Nichols, and was amazed to learn of what appears to be a bias against female authors—at least, at female author names.
I won’t tell you the whole story here, but she tried querying a manuscript under a man’s name rather than her own, using the same pitch. In short, she got lots more acceptances when querying under a man’s name.
Check it out, it’s definitely worth reading. The graphic image came from the article on Jezebel.com.
Ray
© 2015 Ray Rhamey