Some books arrive as manuscripts. Others arrive as a life, a body of work, or an idea that has never been written down. We can start from either, and your name is the one on the cover.
It has been in your head long enough to have chapters. What it has never had is the six uninterrupted months it would take you to write it, and that is a scheduling problem, not a talent one.
A ghostwriter is how a publishing house solves a scheduling problem. You keep the idea, the judgement and the voice; someone whose whole job is putting sentences in order does the putting. The house has been finding writers for other people's books since 1844, and the work is the same now as it was then: listen closely, write carefully, and leave the voice yours.
Fourteen forms the house writes in, each with a page of its own. If yours is not here, it is worth asking: the list is what we do often, not the limit of what we do.
- 01
Biography writing
A life told as a narrative, for readers who did not live it. Research, interviews and a shape that holds a whole person.
- 02
Memoir writing
Your own life, in your own voice, the lessons and the memories, conveyed the way you want them conveyed.
- 03
Fiction writing
Whatever the idea is, written as a novel your readers will finish. Plot, character and pace, made to work together.
- 04
Non-fiction writing
Expertise turned into a book. Argument, structure and evidence, arranged so a reader who is not you can follow it.
- 05
Children's book writing
Books that build a child's imagination, written to the age they are actually for and read aloud before they are finished.
- 06
Story book writing
A story told to readers worldwide through a creative, entertaining narrative, the form before it becomes a genre.
- 07
Action and adventure writing
Fast-paced work that keeps a reader turning: a protagonist, a quest, and no slack between them.
- 08
Military fiction writing
Combat written by people who have read the accounts. What a battle costs, rather than what it looks like from outside.
- 09
Comic writing
Script and panel breakdown for artists to draw from, imagination on the page in the form the medium needs.
- 10
Screenplay writing
Your story in industry-standard screenplay form, formatted the way a reader in the industry expects to receive it.
- 11
Rhyme writing
Lyrical rhyme that holds a reader's interest, the hardest short form to do well and the most obvious when it is done badly.
- 12
Song writing
Lyrics and melody written to be performed, not read. The craft of a line that survives being sung.
- 13
Audiobook production
The written book turned into a narrated one, for the readers who listen rather than read.
- 14
Book trailers
A short film for a book, the thing you send to readers before the book itself is in their hands.
Four things you should be able to expect from anyone you trust with your book, and rarely can.
- 01
Experienced professionals
The team is seasoned wordsmiths who know the ins and outs of crafting a story that holds. Years of practice is what it takes to make an idea shine on the page rather than merely appear on it.
- 02
Range across genres
From a heartfelt memoir to a gripping thriller, the house covers the genres it lists and declines the ones it does not. The writer assigned to your book will have written in its form before.
- 03
Confidentiality first
Your ideas are safe here. Your story is yours; the house is here to bring it to life without compromising your privacy, and the writer's part in it stays between you and us.
- 04
Priced to the work
Quality without the agency mark-up. The house quotes the job in front of it rather than a package, and it will tell you when you need less than you thought you did.
Eight steps, and you approve the work at four of them. Nothing moves forward on an assumption.
Consultation call
A detailed conversation about your vision and your idea, so the house understands exactly what kind of book you want your readers to have.
Questionnaire
A set of questions that gets everyone onto the same page before a word is written, the material only you have, written down where the writer can use it.
Research and preparation
Research and a strategy for the book, so it is clear what the readers you are writing for actually want from it.
The outline
With the vision understood, the outline is built, the foundation the whole book is written on. Nothing proceeds until you approve it.
The first draft
Once the outline is signed off, the writer starts the first draft, which is where the tone and the style of your book get settled.
Finishing the book
The draft comes to you for comment. Your feedback is the guiding light: it is what makes the finished book read as yours rather than as ours.
Final review and approval
The complete manuscript comes to you to read and approve. After your approval it is edited and formatted.
Publishing
Edited, formatted and approved, the book is published and made available to the readers it was written for, in print, in ebook, and on the retail platforms they already use.
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
The ones authors ask before they commit, answered plainly.
Ghostwriting is a collaboration in which a skilled writer crafts the text on your behalf and stays uncredited. The writer turns your ideas into finished prose while keeping your voice and your intentions. Through detailed discussion they learn your vision, tone and style, so the book resonates with your readers as yours. It lets you bring an idea to life without giving up the months writing it would take.
Novels, memoirs, biographies, children's books, and non-fiction of most kinds, as well as the shorter work around a book, from articles to speeches. Whether you are an aspiring author with a book in you or a professional who needs the writing done properly, a ghostwriter's work adapts to the project rather than the other way round.
Read their previous work and see whether the writing sounds like something you would want your name on. Then talk to them about your goals, your vision and your timeline. The match that works is a writer who understands the idea and is genuinely interested in it, compatibility and clear communication matter as much as craft.
That is the whole job. A skilled ghostwriter's pride is in capturing your perspective, your tone and your intentions. Through detailed discussion and continuous collaboration the writer learns how you think, so the book reads authentically as yours and not as a professional's idea of you.
Open and consistent communication. You share the goals, the vision and the specifics you have in mind; then you read, comment and steer as the work goes. That is what lets the writer adjust, and it is why the finished book sounds like you.
Length, complexity, how much research the book needs, and how much of it already exists. Extra rounds of revision or a compressed schedule affect it too. What you should expect from anyone you ask is a transparent structure and a price for your book rather than for a package.
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.