Re: Ghost Writer Questions

On Jan 25, 2008, at 9:47 AM, Elaine Deyo wrote:

> 1) How does ghost writing work? Does the person who employs the ghost
> writer make an outline? Make numerous notes? What is that process?
>
> 2) Are there diffent processes for ghost writing life stories, books
> consisting of the employer's ideas, and/or business writing?
>
> 3) How is the ghost writer paid? A flat fee? (What is reasonable?) Or
> a percentage of the proceeds? (What is usual?) And if a
> percedntage.... is that net? After the employer's expenses? A few
> cents on the sale of each book?

Short answer: it depends

1) ghost writing works however the contract says it works. Some people  
get the buyer to make an outline and give the ghost notes. Others do  
it with extensive interviews. The process is, basically, whatever  
works for you.

2) Like I said before, it REALLY depends. For a business book, I would  
expect he buyer to make an outline for the book and provide most of  
the research, note and so on. The buy is the expert in this case.  
Fora  life story, I'd far more expect to do interviews and write an  
"as told to."

3) again, DEPENDS. You can take a flat fee--for things like memoirs  
and the like, get money UP FRONT whether you take royalties on the  
hind end. For non-fiction books, usually the ghost gets the advance  
and a percentage of the royalties. But there is still the issue of  
writing and marketing the proposal. In general, unless the buyer has a  
book deal in writing, you need to be compensated for your time  
developing the proposal.

There are good books out there on ghostwriting. Try Amazon.

dej

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