4 More Bad Fails to Avoid
Last week, I wrote about four common ghostwriting fails and how to avoid them. Here are four more. 1. A weak first draft. Some would argue that’s inherent and unavoidable, that all first drafts are incomplete, rough, unedited, foul, ugly, rotten, disastrous, and not close to what the client wanted or expected. As a result,…
Read More4 Bad Fails and How to Avoid Them
In a poem from 1711, Alexander Pope wrote, “Too err is human; to forgive, divine.” I’ve recently been dealing with fails as the year draws to a close. I’ve made mistakes, I’ve learned from them, I’ve forgiven myself, and I’ve moved on wiser so the next time, I’ll do it right. Example: I sent out…
Read MoreHow 1,190 Great Professional Writers View AI
What do writers really think of artificial intelligence? It depends on how much you use it. The more you do, the more likely you view it positively. That’s one of the results that came out of a recent study by Gotham Ghostwriters and Josh Bernoff, a Portland, Maine-based advisor, coach, editor, and ghostwriter. Entitled “A.I.…
Read More1 Great Place to Start the Book
There is a famous song from “The Sound of Music” in which the first line says, “Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.” That might be true, but as a ghostwriter I can tell you how wrong it is to start a book there. I once had a client who…
Read More3 AI Tools Can’t Spot Great Human Writing
Even though it’s only mid-November, it isn’t too early to think about next year. As a ghostwriter who last week wrote about working on the business versus working in the business (read it here), I realize now is the time to start considering how I will innovate and continue to grow my business. One way…
Read More1 Great Secret: Work In and On the Business
In his seminal work The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It, entrepreneur Michael E. Gerber quoted the U.S. Department of Commerce: Forty percent of all businesses fail in the first year. eighty percent fail within the first five years, and eighty percent of those that last the…
Read More5 Great Ways Ghostwriters Help with a Brand
Every book, whether ghostwritten or not, becomes part of the author’s brand, so every time a ghostwriter helps an author write a book, the ghostwriter must be aware of the author’s brand. In trying to understand a brand, think about a favorite author, perhaps Stephen King, John Grisham, Robert Ludlum, Ian Fleming, Toni Morrison, Sue…
Read MoreEven 1 Great Newspaper Knows AI’s Bogus
I’ve written several times that when it comes to ghostwriting, humans trump artificial intelligence, or AI, every single time. I recently read an article in the Los Angeles Times that wasn’t even about AI but nonetheless further reinforced my notions. The article’s author, Hossam Elsherbiny, is director of language instruction for the Department of Transnational…
Read More8 More Solid Ghostwriting Examples
As I wrote last week, everything is ghostwriting—or at least, so many types of writing without attribution are forms of ghostwriting. Here are eight more you might not realize. 1. Professional apologies or public statements. It might be easier to list a famous person who hasn’t had to make a public apology than list those…
Read More11 Cases Where It’s All Great Ghostwriting
When people think of ghostwriting, they often think of celebrity autobiographies or political memoirs. It’s true that’s a large part of the industry. After all, Prince Harry, Richard Branson, Andre Agassi, Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Demi Moore, Laura Bush, Michael Jackson, Millie Bobby Brown, Donald Trump, John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan wrote books with the…
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