Between the two sit character, structure and about a hundred thousand words. That gap is the work, and it is work a house has been doing for other people's books since 1844.
Fiction is daunting because it asks for three separate competences at once: people a reader believes in, a world that stays consistent, and a plot that keeps them turning pages. Most unfinished novels are strong on one of the three and stalled on another.
The house works on all three, and on the thing underneath them, diction, the actual choice of words. That is what separates prose a reader moves through easily from prose they have to push against, and it is the least visible and most decisive part of the craft.
Each of these has its own conventions, its own readers and its own way of going wrong. A writer who has worked in yours is assigned to it.
- 01
Drama and romance
Believable characters, a plot with rising tension and real emotional weight, and dialogue that catches how people actually speak to each other when something is at stake.
- 02
Historical fiction
Thorough research first, so the period is accurate and the world is solid, then description and characterisation that make it a place rather than a set. Ancient Rome to the Second World War.
- 03
Science fiction
A world with consistent rules and logic, and themes of technology, society and human nature explored through it. Dystopia, space travel, time travel, ideas that hold up to a reader who knows the genre.
- 04
Fantasy
Lore, culture and characters built to sustain a world readers want to stay in. High fantasy or urban, with the universal themes the genre exists to examine from an angle.
- 05
Mystery and horror
A suspenseful plot with turns the reader does not see coming, characters with motives and secrets, and dread built through atmosphere and pacing rather than announced.
Four things that decide whether a ghostwritten novel reads as yours.
- 01
Writers who read the genre
Strong characters, a plot that turns, and dialogue that carries weight are genre-specific skills. The writer on your book will have written in its form and read widely in it.
- 02
Shaped with you
Genre, plot and characters are worked out with you rather than handed to you. The outline is a document you have argued with before a chapter is written.
- 03
Delivered to the date
Long-form fiction is the easiest kind of project to let drift. The schedule is agreed at the start, and you are told immediately if anything threatens it.
- 04
Priced to the book
Competitive pricing that does not come out of the work. A novel is expensive to have written, and you should know the real figure before you commit rather than after.
Seven steps, with your approval on the first draft before anything is refined.
Order details
Your story idea, the genre, and anything specific you need. Enough for the writer to know what book they are being asked to write.
First draft approval
The first draft comes to you before any revision happens, so you can redirect the book while redirecting it is still cheap.
Feedback and revisions
You and the writer work through the draft together. This is the longest stage and the one that decides how much the finished book sounds like you.
Editing
The manuscript edited by someone who did not write it, structure first, then the line.
Proofreading
A final pass for errors and typos, on text that is not going to move again.
Cover design
A cover designed to the tone and the genre of the finished book rather than to the idea you started with.
Final draft and delivery
The final draft comes to you for approval, then the completed manuscript is delivered in the format you need, ready to publish, here or anywhere else.
A few of the people the house has worked with, in their own words.
I had eleven years of notes and no book. What I got back read like me on a good day, my turns of phrase, my arguments, and none of the padding I would have added myself. The first chapter arrived and I stopped worrying.
Marianne ElleryIndependent author The structural edit was not comfortable reading. It told me the second half started in the wrong place, which I had suspected for a year and nobody had said out loud. Moving three chapters fixed a problem I had been trying to solve with better sentences.
Devon AlukoIndependent author What sold me was being told I did not need half of what I had asked for. I came in wanting the full package and left with a cover, a proofread and an honest explanation of why the rest would not have helped yet.
Priya RaghunathanIndependent author Three cover directions, all of them plausible, none of them the thing I had described. The one I picked worked at the size that actually matters, I could recognise it in a list of forty other books, which is more than I can say for my first attempt.
Tobias HearnIndependent author I own the book outright and that was written down before I paid anything. After two years of being quoted percentages by people who would not put them in writing, that was the whole reason I stayed.
Cecile MarchandIndependent author The audiobook took longer than I expected and they told me why each time rather than going quiet. The narrator they cast got my grandmother's accent right, which I had assumed would be the thing I had to let go of.
Nathan BoakyeIndependent author
What authors ask before commissioning a novel.
Start with the thing you cannot stop thinking about, and write the scene you can already see. Structure can be fixed later; enthusiasm cannot be manufactured. If you want help, a professional writer can work with you on developing the idea, building characters, outlining the plot and giving you feedback that is actually useful rather than encouraging.
A protagonist with goals and motivations a reader can recognise; a plot with rising tension and real conflict; a setting vivid enough to be somewhere; supporting characters who exist for reasons other than the plot; dialogue that sounds like speech; and an ending that pays off what the beginning promised. Most failed novels are missing the last one.
Anywhere from several months to several years, depending on length, the complexity of the plot and the pace of the writer. A ghostwritten novel is faster than a self-written one mainly because it is someone's full-time job rather than their evenings. A realistic timeline is agreed at the start based on your goals and your availability, since your feedback is on the critical path.
Yes, and it is more common than most readers assume. You can commission a whole book or only the parts you are stuck on, outlining, character work, or particular sections. Your name is on the cover either way, and the writer is not credited unless you want them to be.
Because it is written for you from your material, and nothing is reused between projects. Professional writers are also familiar with where the lines sit in copyright, which matters in genre fiction, where influence is normal and imitation is not. If something in your idea is closer to an existing work than you realise, you will be told.
You do, completely. The author holds 100% of the rights to their work, in every format, for its whole life. The house is paid for the work it does, not with a share of the book. That is the arrangement the house reopened in 2008 to offer, and it does not change with the tier, the price or the point at which you come to us.
Yes. Your name is on the cover and in the record. Everyone who works on the book (writer, editor, designer) works on your book, and none of them is credited on it unless you ask for them to be.
Yes. Your story is yours, and nothing about the project leaves the house. We will sign your NDA before you send anything, or supply ours if you would rather use one.
No. Six disciplines are available and you take the ones you need. Authors arrive here at every stage (with an idea, a half-draft, or a finished manuscript that only needs a cover and a shelf) and the work starts where you actually are.
It depends on the work: length, how much research is involved, how much of the book already exists, and which disciplines you need. There is no list price for a book, and any firm who gives you one before reading your material is quoting something other than your book. Tell us where you are and we will price the actual job.
Move the marker. You do not need to know what to call it: you only need to know where you are.
Tell us where your manuscript is, where you want it to go, and we'll show you what's possible.