Stepping into The Spotlight - Andrew Crofts



“So, when are you going to write your own memoir?” people ask whenever I tell stories from my many, many years of ghostwriting.

“Never,” I have always assured them. “I can’t because of all the confidentiality agreements I have signed, all the relationships of trust I have built up with clients over the years.”

Well, now I have done it. Not every story can be told, of course, but for those that can, names have been changed, stories and locations mixed and matched, permissions sought and surprisingly readily given. In the days when I started ghosting, around thirty years ago, secrecy was everything. No one ever admitted they used ghostwriters, no ghostwriters were ever credited or talked about in polite publishing circles. That seems to have changed and most people now get the fact that books need to be written by professionals, edited by professionals and published by professionals.

So on August 14th, “Confessions of a Ghostwriter” will be coming out from Friday Project, an imprint within HarperCollins which started life finding material for books from blogs and other electronic media, (one or two of the stories have appeared before on this website). The cover sports a cartoon of me looking extremely bookish, (my family tell me it is a good likeness), and I must now ready myself to stand by my own words and my own stories after hiding behind more famous and more commercial names for most of my career. It’s exciting, but a little scary.

Comments

Kathleen Jones said…
Ah, so you're working with the wonderful Scott Pack! Look forward to this one.
Lee said…
It sounds as if you've had a fascinating life.
Dennis Hamley said…
That was a fascinating article in today's Observer, Andrew. I learnt more about the dark art than I bargained for. How brilliant of you to negotiate a way through which was both profitable and honourable. One or other, I would have thought, but to manage both shows talent both writerly and personal at a very high level. Great stuff.
julia jones said…
Congratulations, sounds fascinating
julia jones said…
couldn't find Observer article tho ...?
Andrew Crofts said…
Thanks for kind comments. Am currently travelling in the Middle East but have still managed to see Robert McCrum's excellent piece in the Observer and on the Guardian website. It seems to have sent the book hurtling up the Amazon charts, which is gratifying.
Andrew Crofts said…
Thanks for kind comments. Am currently travelling in Middle East but saw Robert McCrum's article in Observer and on Guardian website, which seems to have sent the book rocketing up the Amazom charts, which is gratifying.
Lydia Bennet said…
congratulations Andrew, it seems to be taking off, it sounds fascinating. Observer coverage no less! Good stuff.
Dennis Hamley said…
Julia, it's in the main paper, p32, IN FOCUS, Publishing: From misery memoirs to sporting lives, the ghost's work is never done. A great piece with Andrew in starring role - and it seems to have worked. How can we get the same tretatment?

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