No one grows up thinking they want to be a ghostwriter. No one plans on that job.
I'm so used to being separate from the publication process. I turn in the book to the editor and then I'm done.
I don't think you can take a whole genre of very popular books and say, "This is all trash!" When we read a memoir that isn't by a celebrity, we feel like we're about to go on a journey and we don't know where the journey will lead. But when we read a memoir by a celebrity we feel like we already know the journey and we just want to travel it.
I think that the celebrity memoir as a genre is looked upon as a lesser form. One of my missions as a ghostwriter has been to elevate that form. Maybe that sounds pretentious!
I think one of the big things that's come out of ghostwriting for me is real compassion for the complexity of fame.
We exploit celebrities by caring about shallow things like whether they've gotten a facelift. And we violate their children constantly. But we also love them in a way.
Lizzie Pepper is pure fiction! The character is pulled from tabloids. But I think we all look at celebrity marriages and invest in them.
I’ve taken on some of the emotional weight of the stories I’ve worked on. I was writing about a very difficult time in the life of one of my clients and I burst into tears at a small, crowded café... I’m not a crier at all in my own life. Maybe that’s why I’m a ghostwriter.
I think people dismiss celebrity memoirs as unreal, contrived and maybe partially made up. But that's definitely not true for anything that I write.
I'm handed a bunch of existing data. My job is to put that in the best narrative form. That is a puzzle I love to solve.
None of my clients are criminals, but to a much lighter degree that's what goes on. I hear the story, and I hear it with the level of detail that breeds empathy.
There are certain jobs I don't take because I feel no connection to the person. But if somebody is open with me, and honest about their motivations, and has some level of self-awareness, then I'm going to understand them.
Working with somebody who has a more interesting life than I do - and getting to take on that life temporarily - is an endlessly interesting way to have the experience of writing memoir.
I've been writing books without ego for a very long time. I feel like it will get what it deserves. Or won't get what it doesn't deserve.
