We need more transparency in ghostwriting, not more squeamishness.

The ghostwriter label channels the collective unease of taking credit for a book in which every word didn’t flow from our own pen.  So we cover it with a cloak of invisibility and make it vaguely mysterious.  I’m fine with invisibility, it’s the mystery that irks me. 

I help professionals transform their business model or viewpoints into a book.  We work face-to-face, voice-to-voice, in detailed explorations of their ideas.

Then I retreat, absorb, and write from recorded transcripts that capture both the content and voice--not my voice, but my author/client’s voice. 

With a working manuscript in front of us, we begin again--shaping the manuscript into a book.  Fidelity to the ideas isn’t enough; the author/client’s voice must inhabit every word. 

It’s never easy, and it getting it right can be hard as hell. But there’s nothing shadowy about it, and my author/clients talk about the details of our collaboration without apology.  No secrets.  No ghosts. 

When I’ve written a book that makes a great read of an original idea, I don’t need my name on the cover.  But I will keep clanking around here and there, making enough noise so that the honorable work of writing is visible under the ghost’s sheet.