Many authors want to know how soon a ghostwriter will have
their book ready. Unfortunately, there is no quick and easy answer to that
question. Each project is unique and thus takes a different amount of time.
However, you can pinpoint a few factors that will speed up or slow down the
writing of your book. I even came up with a handy acronym—PACE. Preparedness,
availability, complexity, and expectations.
1. Preparedness.
Say you have all of your notes, audiotapes, files, interviews, case studies,
and outlines ready and raring to go (properly organized and synthesized of course).
If so, you’re a ghostwriter’s dream—they can immediately get to work on writing
your book. But if you’re struggling to put together your layout and materials
when you hire your writer, it may take some time for the two of you to collect
and work through the information that you have.
2. Availability.
This goes for both parties. The more often that you and your ghostwriter can
connect, the faster the book will come to fruition. But if you are a busy
executive or your writer is juggling several projects at once, expect a slower
turnaround time. Try to email, meet, or talk on the phone at least once a week
to check in on the status of the book.
3. Complexity.
By nature, some books are straightforward and others can be Pandora’s boxes of
intricacy. It stands to reason that the more complex your book, the longer it
will take to write. To help expedite the process, look at your project and your
materials as if you were a stranger to them, like your writer will be at first.
Try to anticipate possible questions, tricky spots in the narrative, or
confusing parts of your concept. The better you understand your book, the more
helpful you will be to your writer.
4. Expectations.
Ghostwriters are happy to work with a deadline in mind, but try not to place
them under the gun. Expecting a perfect, polished manuscript in a month simply
isn’t reasonable. In any situation, you will want to give your writer at least
3 – 6 months to complete the project. This time frame gives you two enough time
to get to know one another, transfer materials, and go through at least two
drafts of the book. Don’t fall for the ghostwriting services that promise you a
completed book in 90 days—even if you get your book back in that time frame, it
is unlikely that you’ll be happy with the final product.
Some authors spend years slaving over manuscripts, while
others are able to write 100,000 words in a month. Project goals and deadlines
are important, but keep in mind that it is not the physical book that is
important, but the words on the page. The more time and care you spend working
with your writer to get your draft to its best possible state, the more
successful your book will be.
Contact the Jenkins Group and tell us about your project
Contact the Jenkins Group and tell us about your project
My guess is that it's exceedingly rare to find anyone who can write 100K words in a month.
ReplyDeleteYou'll find that the most prolific novelists are happy to write that much in a year.
Winston Churchill dictated 5K words per day, but how many people like him have ever lived.
A friend of mine has more than 100 non-fiction books to his credit and is one of the most published authors in his discipline. Even though it's taken him 40 years to produce that many volumes, it's still a prodigious output.
Ghostwriters seldom get everything they need. That's because clients have no idea what it takes to put together a readable MSS.
If they did, I doubt that they would bother.
Cheers, Bruce
Great post; I particularly like the PACE acronym. There are so many variables that affect how quickly a book can be written, especially when there is more than one party in the mix, as is the case with a ghostwritten work. Often there's the writer and the client, plus other people in the approvals chain, all of which can slow the process down and introduce complications.
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