Dave Could See That Jim Was Hurt. What Does That Even Mean?
She was happy. He was terrified. The hotel was romantic. Every one of those is the author reaching a conclusion the reader was supposed to reach.
Tag: Revisions
First drafts are supposed to be rough. The book gets made in revision. These articles cover how real revision works: what to cut, what to fix, and how to know when a manuscript is actually finished instead of just abandoned.
Book ROI & Business CaseWill You Ghostwrite My Book for Free? Why Royalty Splits and Exposure Deals Don’t Work
People ask me to ghostwrite for free more than you would believe, offering exposure, royalty splits, or a vague favor in exchange for a supposed bestseller. The answer is always no. Here is what the money actually buys, why cheap…
GhostwritingThe manuscript came back and it doesn’t sound like me. Now what?
The manuscript landed and the voice is wrong, the argument is yours, the structure is yours, but the prose reads like a stranger wrote it. Here is why that happens, the four root causes to diagnose before you react, and…
Book Coaching10 questions to ask a ghostwriter about voice and style before you sign
Voice mismatch is the number-one reason ghostwriting projects fail, and the questions you ask before signing decide whether the manuscript sounds like you when it lands. Here are ten questions focused narrowly on voice and style, each built to reveal…
Book MarketingWriting Quality Control: From Draft to Publishable
Editing is one step. Quality control is the entire system around it, the methodical work that turns a rough draft into something worth publishing. A first draft is meant to be messy; the difference between an author and a drawer…
GhostwritingWhy Your Manuscript Needs a Professional Editor
I hand clients a polished manuscript, every one revised many times before they see it. But building a book and inspecting it are different jobs, and I still tell every client to hire a separate editor. Here is what a…
GhostwritingWhy You Should Never Skip Proofreading Your Book
There is exactly one honest reason to skip proofreading your book: none. A typo does not read as charming spontaneity, it reads as carelessness, and carelessness on page two makes readers doubt everything on page two hundred.
Book SalesFrom Idea to Finished Book: How the Process Actually Works
Every client begins with a vague feeling that there is a book in them somewhere, and no idea what it looks like, and that uncertainty is completely normal. Not one of my 54+ books arrived as a finished concept; each…
GhostwritingThe Ghostwriting Process Is Exactly Like Giving a Cat a Pill
There is a bottle of cat pills on my counter that my fifteen-pound tabby would rather die than swallow, and a three-hundred-page manuscript on my desk that needs to become a book. The two have far more in common than…
GhostwritingSetting Expectations with Your Ghostwriter | The Business Side
The creative side of ghostwriting gets all the attention, but the projects that go smoothly are the ones where the business was settled before the first interview. Scope, payment, expectations: get those clear up front and everything else works. Here…
Amazon & KDP8 Mistakes That Sink a Book (and the Bestsellers That Avoided Them)
Most books that fail do not fail because the writing is terrible. They fail because the author made avoidable mistakes in structure, characters, pacing, or marketing. Here are the most common problems, each paired with a book that got it…