Below are a few common questions and answers related to ghostwriting.

What is a Ghostwriter?

A ghostwriter is a professional writer who partners with you to create your book. The activity of ghostwriting spans the entire process of creating a manuscript that is ready for publication (or submission to agents and publishers). A skilled ghostwriter can develop your book from a rough draft, if you have created one, or—if you have no draft—can interview you to develop your manuscript from scratch. The prefix “ghost” refers to the behind-the-scenes work the ghostwriter does while you remain the visible author of the book. Everything is confidential (signing a Nondisclosure Agreement is standard), and you receive full credit for the work. Take a look at the New York Times Bestseller list; many (most) of the non-fiction titles there were written with the help of a ghostwriter.

What are the typical costs for ghostwriting services?

The price may vary depending on the topic and length of your book. It also varies by ghostwriter quality. Ghostwriters hired through traditional New York agents and publishing houses can run in the neighborhood of $7,000 – $10,000 and up into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. If you search online job posting sites like Elance, Guru, and others, you can find many so called “writers” who are happy to write your book for very little money. The caveat is that many of those writers speak English as a second language and are from non-American countries, so the writing—if your book is supposed to be in English—will likely be substandard and filled with twisted verb use, garbled adjectives, and quirky attempts at humor. Roughly about 2 out of every 50 writers bidding on these sites is a true professional native-English writer, and many of the companies bidding on these online project sites have American addresses that are fronts for non-American companies and workers.

How does the ghostwriting process work?

If you provide the ghostwriter with a rough manuscript, they will edit the manuscript and recommend any major additions, deletions, and modifications, which-upon your approval-either you or the ghostwriter will complete. If you do not have a draft manuscript to start with, the ghostwriter might begin the process by conducting interviews with you, during which you will relate your ideas, experiences, and the vision you have for your book. You may choose to compose the initial draft, in which case the ghostwriter will coach you through the process. Before the work begins, you should convey the reasons you are writing your book and what you wish to accomplish. Once the process begins, your rough draft—or your thoughts and experiences—will be crafted into a well-organized, entertaining, and professional manuscript.

What categories of books are normally ghostwritten?

Memoir, Self-Help, Business, Inspirational, Adventure, Christian Living, Sports, Fitness and Nutrition, Family, Political, Educational, Historical Non-Fiction, and most other non-fiction categories. Far more books are ghostwritten on non-fiction topics than fiction.

Will I be able to speak to the ghostwriter as my book progresses?

Ghostwriting a book is usually a dynamic process, and depending on the nature of your project, you may be involved throughout the entire process. It all depends on how complete your manuscript is, and on how much input from you is required to meet your goals and objectives. You should always know the status of your project, and if you have any questions at all as the project progresses, your ghostwriter should be only an email or a phone call away. You should approve every aspect of your book before it ever becomes available to the public, and this should be outlined in the Service Agreement.

What legal agreements should be in place?

You should require that the project start with written Service Agreement that contains (1) a complete description of deliverables, (2) a well-defined timeline, and (3) a detailed payment schedule. You may also request a Nondisclosure Agreement.

How long does the process take?

The entire process can take anywhere from 1 to 12 months. If the ghostwriter is developing your manuscript from scratch, the interview and writing process can take up to 10 months to produce a polished manuscript. If you provide the initial manuscript, the process can proceed more rapidly.

About Juggernaut Press

Juggernaut Press has award-winning, published writers on staff, including accomplished ghostwriters, book coaches, and Internet marketers. They have ghostwritten hundreds of books, some that have appeared on the NY Times bestseller lists. Their clients include novelists, screenwriters, public figures, television producers, CEOs, advertising and marketing executives, physicians, psychologists, marketing/life coaches, public speakers, military personnel, missionaries, and other talented individuals and high-profile organizations.

To discuss a ghostwriting project, you can contact them at:

staff@JuggernautPress.com

www.JuggernautPress.com

First and foremost, a quality book cover should engage the potential buyer.

If you take the time to observe the book covers for those books on the New York Times Bestseller List, you will discover that nearly all of those cover designs employ some type of custom lettering. Custom lettering takes time, and design time costs money–usually lots of money.

Although it is usually not cost effective to spend thousands of dollars to hire a custom graphic designer for your book cover until you know you will sell a few copies, you can however get some fairly high-quality effects with just a few hours of design time.

Here is a recent JuggernautPress.com cover design in which this concept is put to practice:

Can you see how the lettering has been manipulated to emphasize the concept of the book?

First of all, the main title letters are overlapping in a way that gives the impression that each letter is ATTRACTING those letters beside it.

The next design element employed here is in the subtitle. When a viewer first encounters the design, their eyes are naturally drawn to the main title, and this is where the letters are attracted to one another. Note that a 3D effect has been implemented to make the main title appear slightly in the distance. The viewer’s eyes acknowledge this and then move immediately to the subtitle: “The Secret Is In Your Mind.” Notice how the subtitle words are perceptively much closer to the viewer than the main title. When the eyes travel from the title to the subtitle, the effect is that of the subtitle coming closer, because it is positioned closer to the viewer–as though the subtitle is ATTRACTED to the viewer. This second effect also engages the reader subconsciously, and it does so in a way that is relevant to the topic of the book.

We offer book cover design services at very affordable prices. For example, approximately 6-8 hours of design time went into the subject cover. You can find our book cover design pricing here: www.BetterCovers.com

For quality book design services, and other publishing and editorial services, contact us at: www.JuggernautPress.com

During my career as a writer, I’ve ghostwritten several hundred books (all non-fiction) and I’ve read many more than that. From all of this, one thing resonates as the most important component of any book (or anything at all put down in writing actually):

STORY

What do I mean by STORY?

Let me illustrate. My first career job was as a project manager in one of the biggest and “best” (in terms of culture) multi-national corporations. I made lots of money, enjoyed good benefits, and I had a promising future.

But sometimes I felt like just another cog in a giant impersonal wheel—like my creative spirit was being stifled. During my ten years there, certain things happened that helped me understand that I did not belong there. Like the day my manager was giving me feedback on a training manual I had just completed. As managers go, he was a guy I did not care for much. I think this was primarily because he was not very open and I always wondered what he was thinking. In his quietness, I always felt like I had to talk to break the silence, and then I felt sort of awkward revealing myself since he didn’t often reveal his own feelings or thoughts.

“I really don’t know where you learned how to write,” he said, “but this is really good. I’ve read it twice and I have to say that I really like the writing.”

He was turning the pages of the manual as he spoke. “Something about it makes it a pleasure to read.” And he laughed like he was surprised that a training manual could affect him like that.

It was one of the only times I had ever seen him show emotion. He was truly excited and I could sense it in his words and body language. Looking back now, I see this as one of several defining moments in my own personal story. It helped me open my eyes to the fact that I had to leave that corporation. I had to leave all that security behind and strike out on my own…

It was part of my STORY.

So what do I mean by STORY?

In short, I mean a narrative that is grounded in emotion.

If you don’t infuse ALL of your writing with STORY, then you will likely lose your audience…and fast. Unless of course you are creating a training manual. But even that can be done using the power of STORY—and it should be if it anything more complicated than an assembly guide.

Why infuse a training manual with STORY?

Because it makes the reading experience more pleasurable, so why not?

Most of us go through life thinking the language we speak read and write is a static sort of thing, when actually it is constantly changing.

Consider the sentence: “Some may require followup a month after the sale, while others will require a followup immediately.”

HERE, followup is used as a noun. Since the dictionary does not define the word “followup,” I would hyphenate it. But actually a new word is evolving and being formed in our language. Remember, the English language—and any language for that matter—is a moving target, as are the grammar rules of the language.

If you doubt this, take a moment to read some Shakespeare, which is only several hundred years old. Note that many of the words he uses are outdated now and to understand his stories, you must do quite a bit of work deciphering all the subtle nuances in the words.

Language is moving, and at a pretty fast pace. Listen to the slang words of any teenager and watch them grow in popularity. At first, the words sound odd and out of place; but before long, the mainstream media has taken them up and we have included them in our own vocabulary. When a new word emerges, a sort of democratic process takes place with usage being equivalent to a vote. If the word gets enough “votes,” ultimately it is formally accepted into the language by being included in the dictionary.

Teenagers are not the only word generators in society; technology is the provenance of many. As technology evolves and new processes and objects (verbs like google and nouns like computer) emerge, words to describe them are added to the lexicon.

Think of “followup” or “follow-up” as a noun or adjective, and “follow up” as a verb construction.
- “She is going to follow up.”–verbish.
- “He is going to get some follow-up.”–nounish
- “He is going to a follow-up meeting.”–adjective.

Back to Shakespeare for a moment. Consider the following line from Twelfth Night, Act1, Scene II:

“Perchance he is not drown’d: what think you, sailors?”

Consider the word, perchance. Is it possible that this word started as two words “per chance.” Is this sort of like “follow up” and “followup”?

I think so.

staff@juggernautpress.com

www.juggernautpress.com