5 Myths About Ghostwriting

I was listening to a podcast recently where I heard a bestselling, well-known author say the following:

“I’m not going to claim to write a book I didn’t write…that sh*t drives me bananas…If you didn’t write your book, please don’t call yourself a bestselling author.”

He went on to say this practice—paying someone else to do your work and then taking credit for it—would be unacceptable in every other industry. He admits it’s a personal pet peeve, but still, these words were disheartening because it promotes some wrong ideas about ghostwriting as a profession—and about the authors who pay them.

So let’s bust some ghostwriter myths:

Myth #1: The ghostwriter is the true author of the book, but their fee is?“hush” money so the named author gets credit.

So let’s just start right here since it addresses the myth from the podcast mentioned above…

It’s important to distinguish writer from author.

An AUTHOR is the owner of the idea.

A WRITER is someone who puts words together so ideas can transfer from one brain to another.

When I work with an author, they're writing their book aloud through conversation. I'm there to clean it up and make it more fit for public consumption. Believe me, I couldn't come up with the vast majority of the books I've ghostwritten. (Okay, none of them.) And the words on the page may be assembled by me, but those words are largely the author's words...and the author has THE final say on the copy.

When it comes down to it, I would feel downright weird having my name on the cover of most of the books I’ve ghostwritten because I would’ve NEVER sat down to write a similar book on my own.

This myth also overlooks the fact that some ghostwriters do get co-author credit. If you’ve ever bought a book that has this on the cover:

“Written by FAMOUS WRITER with NON-FAMOUS WRITER”

…then that means the NON-FAMOUS WRITER was the ghostwriter. They just worked out terms to get co-author credit in the deal, which is fine, especially if the book is within a niche or genre they want to grow into with their own work.

Now, moving on…

Myth #2: Getting credit for someone else’s work is unacceptable in any other industry.

Since the author in the podcast mentioned this myth, let’s tackle it head-on…

For starters, it’s just completely false. People get credit for someone else’s work all the time—and not maliciously—but as a matter of practicality.

Open any history book and you’ll see facts like, “Qin Shi Huang built the Great Wall of China.” Obviously, he didn’t build it himself…but he gets the credit because it was his idea to join the sections of wall together.

During the Renaissance, many of the famous artists ran studios filled with apprentices who would do 90% of the actual painting. But the artist would do the face and hands and get full credit as the creator. And now those paintings are still worth millions.

One of my clients won a prestigious tech award and shared with me how it felt odd to be listed as the winner because really the achievement belonged to the entire team. But the nature of the award meant someone’s name had to be assigned to it and as the CEO of the company, that meant his name. He gets the credit even though it was a team effort.

The author in the podcast references someone winning the Oscar for Best Actor, how they would never give the award to someone who didn’t do the performance. Perhaps. But what he’s neglecting is all the people who were involved in the actor’s performance:

• The script writer who developed the dialogue and scenes
• The director who coached the actor in their performance
• The makeup artist/hair stylist who helped the actor get into character
• And many others who helped the actor get the role in the first place

The actor who wins the award would not have been able to do so without the work of all these others. That’s why they thank so many people in their acceptance speeches. They’re not just being nice…they’re acknowledging the work of those who made the win possible.

So it is with ghostwriting. We are the script writer, the director, the makeup artist all rolled into one. But to say this idea doesn’t fly in any other industry is just, well, wrong.

Myth #3: Ghostwriters are just transcribers.

I’ve seen this one come up with some clients who didn’t work out. Essentially, they didn’t see me as a partner or co-creator, but expected me to be one-part court reporter and one-part mind reader. Then when the first draft didn’t match their unrealistic expectations, they were frustrated, yet couldn’t provide clear feedback on what would be better.

One time when this happened, I blamed myself for the project falling apart. Only after talking with a fellow ghostwriter did I realize I too had bought into this myth of expecting myself to perfectly transcribe words and intentions. In reality, the author had come into the process with the wrong expectations of my role.

As a ghostwriter, it’s not just my job to write down the author’s ideas…but to push them to go deeper and develop their ideas further.

My main job is to engage with the author in dialogue and find the missing ideas and words that need to be there to strengthen their main idea. The clackity-clackity of my keyboard is just part of this process. Do some of my ideas/words make it in? Okay, sure. Sometimes. But that's more to do with the fact that we humans share ideas and spark thoughts in one another. A great author gets me dwelling on their idea. And a great ghostwriter makes the author go deeper.

Myth #4: Ghostwriting is a dying model. You can get the same out of AI and Grammarly now.

Here’s the deal. You could use a voice-to-text program, coupled with Chat GPT, and then run it through Grammarly to create a book. Sure.

Will it be any good? Probably not.

Great books require a human touch because they are intended for a human reader.

I’m seeing the opposite be true…ghostwriting is MORE in demand than ever. It’s going from being shrouded in secrecy to being celebrated. It’s beginning to be recognized as its own art form, separate from traditional writing.

Certainly, the model will change as technology does. New tools will emerge which help ghosts do our job faster and more efficiently. I myself use some AI tools to help me with transcription and idea generation.

But to say it’s dying? Nah.

Myth #5: Ghostwriting is only for people who can’t actually write.

I can see why someone would believe this. There are times when someone hires a ghostwriter because they recognize they lack the skills for creating compelling content. (ooh, look at that alliteration.)

But I would say at least half of my clients have had some natural knack for writing and storytelling. Many of them have literally sent me material to add to the book. I actually LOVE it when this happens because I can see the author get excited about the book and wanting to take further ownership in the message.

The real reason I see for why authors hire ghostwriters is more about TIME than anything else—they simply lack the hours in the day required to put together their book. They recognize someone like myself not just do this for them, but can do it faster than they can.

One of my recent clients had written about 25,000 words of a manuscript over the course of 8 years. Probably 10,000 words of it ended up in the final published book. The rest was reworked in some form or fashion, but the ideas were still present even if we had swept away the actual passages.

But he recognized if he was EVER going to get his book out in the world, he needed a collaborator to push him to finish it. And now he gets to add “bestselling author” to his list of accomplishments.

Ghostwriting has a long history and legacy. Baruch the Scribe was the ghostwriter for the prophet Jeremiah in the Bible. Alexander Hamilton was George Washington’s ghostwriter for much of his wartime and presidential correspondences—and his famous Farewell Address.

These myths have arisen because of a fundamental misconception about what we ghostwriters do and the role we happily play in the process. While I never expected ghostwriting to be a major part of my writing career, I love doing it. It’s an intellectual challenge which has made me become a better writer.

So what are some other myths I didn’t cover? Reach out if you’d like to learn more about ghostwriting or schedule a free 20-minute Q&A session with me. I’d love to bust some more myths.