William Hammett

Welcome to How to Hire a Ghostwriter.  I'm William Hammett, a ghostwriter and editor for the past sixteen years.  I've also published novels, short stories, and poetry under my own name for the past thirty years.  Additionally, I've written newspaper articles and held editorial positions and have an in-depth knowledge of the publishing industry.  And I've studied the craft of writing with some of the biggest professors and authors of my generation.

Ghostwriting has been around for a very long time.  Even Mark Twain and other well-known authors have ghostwritten books.  In fact, you might be surprised at the number of successful authors whose books you buy at Barnes and Noble, CVS, or the airport who also ghostwrite fiction.  And everyone has heard of The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, and Goosebumps.  All of these series were produced by ghostwriters.

With the explosion of the internet, many saw an opportunity to advertise themselves as ghostwriters.  When I myself started out, I had fifteen online competitors.  Today, I have approximately one hundred thousand.  Unfortunately, most of the people advertising on Google or Bing are moonlighters and don't have the experience or expertise to write a full-length book.  They often see internet ads saying, "Work at home!  Make big money as a ghostwriter!"  Many people decide to put up websites and call themselves ghostwriters because their high school and college English teachers (or friends) told them that they wrote "good papers."

As for ghostwriting companies, which are springing up like weeds, they are really POD companies that subcontract work to writers (and I use the term loosely) who are inexperienced, many being English majors, unemployed individuals, or moonlighters trying to augment their household incomes.

Here's the problem.  The new ghostwriting industry is filled with people who can't write a sentence without awkward phrasing or grammatical errors.  They're just following a business model to pick up some extra cash and never emotionally invest themselves in the projects they take on.

And then there are the ghostwriting clearinghouses, like elance, odesk, fiverr, and upwork.  People post their resumes on these sites and write books for a song, sometimes charging as little as a thousand dollars.  If anyone with some street cred examines the resumes these writers post, it's easy to see that they commit a dozen major grammatical and phrasing errors in the space of a single opening paragraph.  If they can't write a resume or simple paragraph, they sure as hell can't write a book.

With so many people trying to get published, or self-published as the case may be, people are turning to these ghostwriters who know as much about writing a book as a second grader.  Writing a book is a labor-intensive process that calls for consummate skill in planning, phrasing, organization, actual composition, revision, and yes, knowledge of the basic rules of grammar.  If you want a book to be published--and everyone does, right?--then it's imperative to know how the publishing industry works.  How does one choose an agent, write a proposal or query, and then actually submit a manuscript?  What are the odds of acceptance?  For self-publishing, one needs to know a great deal about the integrity of POD firms, as well as marketing, distribution, promotion, editing, and a dozen other areas.

I started this blog (and many others) to alert people to the scams, ineffective package deals, bad writing, and inexperienced writers working at the ghostwriting companies and clearing houses.  After sixteen years of producing quality manuscripts for clients, I am appalled whenever I am shown the work of my competitors or read their websites, which are riddled with basic grammatical errors.

So what sets me apart or qualifies me to write this blog?

I was formally trained in graduate school in writing, editing, textual criticism, research, and publishing.  And as noted above, I have decades of experience in the literary marketplace, working with agents and editors and producing my own work as well as writing for others.  It is my hope that readers of these posts, readers who seek to use a ghostwriter to write their books, will educate themselves by assimilating the information on this site.  Most people in need of a ghostwriter simply don't know very much about ghostwriting, the publishing industry, writing in general, or the scammers waiting to take their money.  I hope you will find these articles interesting and informative.  Most of all, I hope they enable you to make an informed, intelligent decision when selecting a ghostwriter.  If I can be of help, please email me.

Good luck!

William Hammett

Contact: wmhammett@aol.com 

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A Book Is as Long as It Needs to Be

Many ghostwriters are now trying a new business model of offering shorter books to clients.  This has become a popular selling point in the new POD and eBook climate in which ghostwriters and POD publishers try to bring in more clients who (they fear) might not want to pay a reasonable price for a longer book.  The truth is that a book is as long as it needs to be.

Some books do indeed lend themselves to a shorter length.  Novellas are naturally shorter than full-length novels, and nonfiction categories such as how-to, self-help, and motivational may well call for briefer treatments.  Sometimes business professionals simply want a platform book to help in their branding and franchise building, and length is not an issue.

But someone searching for a publisher and ghostwriter should beware of these low price point offers.  Don't compromise the content and integrity of your book.  Make sure that your subject receives the full treatment it deserves.  Trying to get you to contract for a shorter book is like a car salesman attempting to have you drive off the lot with a smaller model car, one that you really don't want and that won't meet your needs.

Remember: a book is as long as it needs to be.  Don't let salesmanship sully the integrity your book demands.

~William Hammett

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Is Your Ghostwriter Familiar with the Publishing Industry?

A client who wishes to hire a ghostwriter should have some idea of what his or her publishing goals are.  Does the client wish to receive a traditional contract from a large mainstream publisher?  Does the client want to seek a small or independent publisher?  Finally, does the client want to seek self-publication with a POD firm?

Unless a ghostwriter is extremely familiar with the literary marketplace, he or she can't help you assess the chances that you will attain your goals. A top-tier ghostwriter should be thoroughly knowledgeable about the submission process, literary agents, large and small publishing houses, royalties, the editorial process, and all pre-flight measures (the steps that it takes to edit, print, promote, distribute, and launch a book).  The ghostwriter should also be familiar with small and independent presses that are viable options to seeking a contract from a major New York publisher.

Finally, POD, while still affordable, has become more expensive, and most POD companies only offer package deals that include unnecessary services.  They make money on upselling promotional packages that are worthless in getting publicity for an author's book.  A ghostwriter worth his salt can help steer you through the confusing waters of self-publication.  Gone are the days when iUniverse would publish a book for $99.

There's simply no substitute for experience and a working knowledge of the literary marketplace.  You can have the best book in the world, but if you don't have a strategic plan for getting it into print, it will eventually die a quiet death.

~William Hammett

Contact: wmhammett@aol.com 

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Editing Won't Make Bad Writing Better

One misconception that I've come across lately is the belief that one can hire an inexperienced ghostwriter who charges small fees (or is a moonlighter) with the belief that editing will make up for the poorly-written manuscript at a later date.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  If a manuscript is badly written and organized, the chances of attaining a literary agent are nil. In turn, a badly-written book will never find a home with a major publisher without an agent since major publishers stopped accepting unsolicited manuscripts eighteen years ago.  In other words, a poorly-written book will never have the opportunity to find the editing that was envisioned at the beginning.

Getting published is tough.  There's no shortcut, and settling for a manuscript filled with errors betrays a fundamental ignorance of the publishing industry.  There are a lot of protocols that need to be observed in trying to get your manuscript recognized at any level of publishing, and that includes small and independent presses as well.  The first step in trying to get your book into print is simple: make sure it's a good one, one that is well-written and stands out from the others.

It's true that developmental editing or ghostwriting can help get a book into shape, but that has to be one of the initial steps in the process.  But expecting a major league editor at a large New York City publishing house to clean up a bad book?  It's not going to happen.

~William Hammett

Contact: wmhammett@aol.com 

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Hiring a Ghostwriter: What You Don't Know Can Hurt You

When hiring a ghostwriter, the biggest impediment to finding the right one for you is that you might not be able to recognize the potential ghostwriter's bad writing.  A majority of online ghostwriting websites are riddled with poor phrasing and grammatical errors.  This is when hiring a qualified professional becomes a Catch-22.  If you need a writer because you can't do the composition yourself, you may not be able to see that you're considering hiring a ghostwriter who is committing high school level writing errors.

On most websites I've examined, as well as resumes on ghostwriting clearing house sites such as odesk, elance, and upwork, it's easy to spot nonstandard usage, misspellings, capitalization errors, run-on sentences, sentence fragments, subject-verb agreement errors, omitted words, missing word endings, tense shifts, and dozens of other errors that a professional writer would never make in a polished advertisement.  Many don't even know the difference between to-too-two, it's-its, your-you're, or there-their, they're.

What you don't know can cost you a lot of money.  Many people pay good money to have a manuscript ghostwritten, only to have someone tell them later that it's filled with errors.  Let the buyer beware.

~William Hammett

Contact: wmhammett@aol.com 

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Ghostwriting: You Get What You Pay For

Many people try to find the least expensive ghostwriter and hire the cheapest one they can find.  But the old adage really is true: you get what you pay for.  You wouldn't ask a cardiac surgeon to perform your bypass for a hundred dollars.  In the same way, low-end ghostwriters usually are trying to bring in a few extra dollars, and a majority don't have good writing skills.  If you examine their websites or resumes posted on elance, odesk, or upwork, you'll notice that they commit the most glaring of grammatical errors.  Why hire someone who doesn't have a basic grasp of the English language?

Some potential clients believe that good writing doesn't matter and that editors "somewhere down the line" will clear up grammatical errors and poor phrasing.  This betrays a fundamental ignorance about the publishing industry.  Major publishers, such as those in New York City and elsewhere, do not accept submissions any longer except from literary agents, and getting a literary agent can be quite difficult.  Too many people believe that once a book is written, it will automatically be published and therefore get the editing and TLC that compensates for a poor first draft, but this is not how publishing works.  Getting a manuscript accepted for publication requires that you present an agent with a professional, polished manuscript.  They're not interested in sloppy work.

~William Hammett

Contact: wmhammett@aol.com  
 
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