Writing

Even AI Agrees 8 Billion Humans are Better

By Lee Barnathan / March 7, 2024
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I’m always trying to stay informed about the ghostwriting industry, and one subject I know I need to study more is AI ghostwriting. Recently, I came across a website called hypotenuse.ai, which sells a variety of ghostwriting services using the Bespoke tool.  Naturally, the site describes all the great things AI, or artificial intelligence, can…

Ghostwriters See All Kinds, Even This Pale Bad 1

By Lee Barnathan / March 5, 2024
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As a ghostwriter, I recently received this email: I arrived in Los Angeles on October 31st from Mississippi to attend the LA Film School. I didn’t have the means to get an apt, so I lived in my car id travel at night to various places all over Los Angeles way up in the mountains…

Secrets of Ghostwriting: It’s 2 Jobs, Writing and Coaching

By Lee Barnathan / February 19, 2024
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I once had a pair of ghostwriting clients who in our first meeting confessed, “We really don’t know what we’re doing. We need you to tell us what to do.” In other words, while they hired me to ghostwrite their book, the reality was they needed a coach as much as a ghostwriter. That’s not…

1 Frustrating Ghostwriting Secret: Hurry Up and Wait

By Lee Barnathan / February 12, 2024
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Before ghostwriting, I was a sportswriter, and one lesson I quickly learned was hurry up and wait. When I covered any college or professional game, there was a mandatory cooling-off period afterwards when the press had to wait before gaining access to the teams. This often extended to before the game, too. I remember covering…

When 1 Beautiful Ghostwriter-Client Relationship Ends

By Lee Barnathan / January 22, 2024
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Ghostwriters don’t automatically deal with a lot of death, but I’ve been lately. Three friends lost their mothers in a matter of weeks. My wife and I have been attending memorials and making condolence calls. Also, a friend died at just 67, sending shockwaves through our social circle. And now, a ghostwriting relationship is at…

Ghostwriting: 3 Good Outlines, 3 New Lengths

By Lee Barnathan / January 2, 2024
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As I’ve previously written, the outline is the most important part of the ghostwriting process. It provides a plan, a blueprint, a direction, a pathway—call it what you want—to help you write the book.  There is no way to ghostwrite a tightly focused book without first having an outline to determine what’s going in, where…

Why a Heart Defect was a Ghostwriter’s 1st Compelling Story

By Lee Barnathan / December 26, 2023
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Fifth of an occasional series about stories and ideas worth telling. A heart defect is not inherently compelling. As a ghostwriter, if someone pitched me to ghostwrite a story about a guy who overcame a heart defect, I’d first ask, “What else is there to the story?” and if there was nothing, I’d turn it…

Ghostwriters Should be so Lucky to Tell This 1 Kind of Story

By Lee Barnathan / December 18, 2023
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Fourth in an occasional series about stories and ideas worth telling. One criterion ghostwriters should look for when deciding what story to help tell is how mouth-droppingly amazing the story is. If when hearing the whole story, I find my mouth agape and my vocalizing the sentences, “Oh my God. I can’t believe that!” or…

Why Parental Alienation is 1 Subject Worth a Ghostwriter’s Time

By Lee Barnathan / December 4, 2023
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Third in an occasional series about ideas and stories that are worth telling. As a speech writer in NYC, I get pitched story ideas all the time and many from people who have overcome deep adversity that feel compelled to share their experiences with the world. Sometimes the story doesn’t resonate with me, and since…

Why “Eva’s Uncommon Life” Was 1 Holocaust Story Worth Telling

By Lee Barnathan / November 27, 2023
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This is the second of an occasional series of stories I worked on that are worth telling. According to study.com, there have been more than 20,000 books written about the Holocaust. It is a sensitive topic from personal and historic standpoints, and a ghostwriter has to make sure that if he or she is going…