JustWriteBooks: Nonfiction Writing & Publishing Help

Even though I’m a ghostwriter, most of what I write comes from the heart. I connect with my clients, their messages, and in many cases with their missions. This week, I found myself in tears.

What I can’t tell you here would fill a book, like my client-author’s name, the subject, or a synopsis of the story. Heck, I will fill a book with that stuff. But what I can say is that I’m one happy ghostwriter today. Just before the end of the year, our literary agent, my client, and the nonfiction book proposal I’ve been loving and laboring over since last spring sealed the deal and garnered a whopper book advance.

Until now, I’ve turned down offers of ghostwriting memoirs. I have an aversion to the quick-let’s-get-a-book-out approach to writing (à la Sarah Palin’s “Going Rogue,” about which I wrote last week). Ego-fluffers need not apply.

Then how did I wind up ghostwriting a memoir now?

Sure, blame the ghostwriter. It’s a slightly suspicious career anyway, right? Besides, who ever heard of someone like me saying boo about her client-author? Isn’t that what nondisclosure agreements are supposed to prevent?