I ain’t afraid of no ghost(writer)

When book people gather to determine which books will be bestsellers (I wish!) and share tales of grammatical errors past, one topic is sure to stimulate conversation that could get heated – or at least a degree or two above lukewarm. Are ghostwriters ethical? Is the ‘author’ of a ghostwritten book lying? Pearls are clutched, red pens are drawn and looks that could crimp the pages of your average Complete Works are exchanged.

Okay, slight exaggeration, but it’s somewhat controversial is what I’m getting at.

Much of the, shall we say, professional distaste for ghostwriters is confined to fiction specifically. I think we all understand that there are stories out there that are in the public interest (or at least, that the public will be interested in, often enough to shell out $50 for a brand-new hardback at Christmastime) but that are in the experience of someone who has a shortage of the time and/or writing skill to pen their own tale. Thus, the autobiographies of politicians (and princes), sports stars and people who lived through an event. Perhaps a slight miasma of contempt drifts over the glossy covers of these non-fiction works, but it really shouldn’t. Writing is a skill that not everyone can or needs to cultivate: who am I to say a fan of sports team x should be deprived of player y’s story, simply because y is very good at said sport and not so good at delivering a satisfying narrative structure or, indeed, spelling ‘they’re’ correctly on even the second attempt. Sure, they could be honest and remove the ‘auto’ from autobiography, but people want to believe y is speaking to them; in a way, he is.

And so the circle is drawn, the candles are lit and the ghostwriter is summoned from beyond the veil. This is when a huge amount of work begins, for writer AND subject. Gruelling interviews, endless emails, repeated follow-ups. The ghostwriter’s job is to gather the information they need to write the book (research), use their professional skill to transform it into a format one might recognise as a book (write) and cultivate that book into something that readers, commissioners and subject are going to be happy with (storytelling, marketing and diplomacy). They get paid; they don’t get their name on the cover.

So far, so business-like. Let’s take a left turn into fiction and – uh oh, quicksand ahead and wolves on either side. This is where it gets a little hard for people.

We have this idea of the artist (or even artiste) in fiction; that there’s a tortured individual behind every story, whether that be ‘man can’t connect to his family in a Booker-prize-winning way’ or ‘woman finds boyfriend in a very specifically kinky way’. You do get this attitude in other artforms – the auteur director, the maestro, the prima ballerina – but we also accept that most art involves some level of collaboration (one might even argue that all art at base is collaboration between creator and audience, but that’s another story). The director has an assistant, cinematographer, costume designers, actors … The maestro works with their orchestra to create a precise musical moment that exists only through their cooperation. The prima ballerina has her corps de ballet, lighting, music, choreography – heck, the people taking tickets in the foyer!

Writers, too, collaborate. There are people who write with co-authors, each bringing more than the sum of their parts. There are early readers, editors, booksellers, editors, reviewers, and of course, editors (please hire an editor if you are publishing a book). And sometimes, yes, ghostwriters.

I tend to think of a ghostwriter as something like a session musician. They bring their skill to the enterprise, following the creative vision provided by their employer and adapting their working practice to that particular work. The employer still needs to kick things off and shape the process. They don’t send a sack of gold and sit back until the manuscript is flung onto their doorstep. It’s a relationship.

I for one fully support ghostwriters. Writing and publishing books is a business, and why we’re expected to treat that business any different to every other business where we delegate tasks, enlist help and support, and seek advice from those who have walked the journey before us, I’m not sure.

Where perhaps we are falling down is the issue of credit. Whose name is all shiny on the cover? Well, it’s the author. Who wrote the book? To a large extent, someone other than the author. Hmm. Are we okay with that? Shouldn’t the tortured soul who put the words one in front of the other (after the other, after the other) be the one who gets the glory? Whatever glory there is for the getting, anyway.

Which again comes back to this cultural idea of books being either this huge individual effort, or kinda tacky. Which is a bit weird, right? We can be loyal readers to an author, or a brand (think Babysitter’s Club), but turn up our noses at the idea of a professional writer who has hired another professional writer to write a book that otherwise wouldn’t get written – regardless of how much effort the hiring body has put in, or how little the hiree wants their name on the thing (and there are valid reasons not to want their name attached at all). If we could get past this ‘tortured artist’ ideal, books could be more open about the people involved in their creation, beyond an optional and generous mention in the acknowledgements (and yes some publishing companies do credit editors on the imprint page or otherwise list contributors to the process). Do we need a credits section at the back, as at the end of a film or inside a theatre programme? Can we then get over this idea of books as the brainchild of one person, and one person alone?

Ghostwriting has a number of advantages, for both parties.

1. The book will get written. Maybe the author doesn’t have time, or maybe they’re not that into writing as a craft in and of itself. Maybe disability or skill in the language they want the book to appear in is a factor. Maybe confidence is an issue. Whatever the case may be, and while of course there are other workarounds if the author was determined to write the thing themselves, hiring a ghostwriter means that the project is a go.

2. It can take the emotion out of the process. Once the Book is underway, it becomes a project. For some people, this takes the emotional weight of Creation out of the equation, so we can get down to brass tacks (so to speak).

3. Other people have good ideas sometimes. Collaboration almost always makes things better.

4. Both parties get a chance to hone their craft. The author can see how the ghostwriter does things, and maybe learn something that will make them better writers. The ghostwriter earns a wage while practising their skills in a job they presumably enjoy, without the financial and reputational risks of publishing a book themselves, under their own name (for example, Casper is a friendly ghostwriter in the horror genre, with aspirations to write children’s fiction in his own name one day. Given the branding issue we’ve touched on, he doesn’t want his name attached to the horror novels he writes, in case it puts parents off).

5. Everyone has something for their portfolio. The author has been project leader on the finished book. The ghostwriter has something they can point to with their ghostly fingers as they intone, ‘I wrote that.’

Being a writer-for-hire has its drawbacks. L J Smith’s Vampire Diaries (formative works in my personal history) are one example where the writer was, to my mind, poorly treated. The success of those books, and later the TV series, was not shared with the creative mind behind the series. Smith lost control of the story (a tragedy for Team Damon as well as a literary injustice). It can unfortunately be a recipe for exploitation, and a rights and IP minefield.

What we need, in my opinion, though, is more light being shed on these shadowy corners. Illuminate those who have made work possible. Share the glory.

See, not so scary after all.

Ghost, ghoul or otherwise, if you’ve written your book and are ready to collaborate, get in touch today. I’d love to hear about your project and discuss how I can help you turn your creativity into a real life book (no candle-based summoning required).

An alternate version of this article was adapted as a post at R. A. Wright Editing (click here to view), and was inspired by the wonderful R. A. Wright. All extracts used with permission by both parties.