question about ghostwriters

doomwdfortune said:

so be and my boyfriend have been trying work work together for a while on a story idea i had. for the most part hes agreed to be my ghost writer but in the end we've spent more time arguing then actually succeeding on getting anything done. now i know this is a bit different then a standard arrangement but still aren't ghost writes at lest somewhat beholden to the creator to try and create their vision instead of completely changing it? the original idea i had was a story set in a zombie apocalypse that would start out with a group of 3-4 girls who have to fight and survive through this, part of the story would lead to them starting a romantic relationship down the line but for the most part the main story is about them and the family theyv'y crated with each other and the things they've had to do to keep each other alive

Click to expand...

How much are you paying him?

The problem is that ideas are easy, but writing them down in a form that tells a story is the difficult bit. It sounds as if he's doing the heavy lifting here.

doomwdfortune said:

nothing...i mean other then you know being a loving boyfriend.....that and half of the profits id their is any....i know i cant just be like hey im the creator your the ghost writer you do what i say and i don't want to that's why i asked him cause hes good at fixing problems in stories and stringing them together....but i kinda you know want to be able to be like hey im the creator this is how i want it done... its not a minor part of the story either its one of the big main parts of what its about

Click to expand...

Then no, you don't get to tell him what to do if he's writing it, sorry.

I have yet to meet a writer, of anything, who hasn't said they write and had people -- strangers, family, friends -- say 'omg, I have a great idea! Why don't you write it and we'll split the profits.'

I have yet to meet a writer, of anything, who has agreed to a plan like this, because ideas are a dime a dozen. Ideas are close to no one's problem. It's actually putting the ideas on paper and churning out a book that's the hard part. Hence, no offense, but if you want it written the way you want it, you're going to have to write it, or hire an actual ghostwriter, who, for 10 or 20 thousand dollars up front (at least), will write what you conceive.

Have you considered collaborating with him? You both write, both plot, etc., so you'll have equal footing and can have collaborative discussions about how it should go? I'm not suggesting that's an easy road, btw. Collaborating is very tricky; both parties have to have their own strengths and be able to work through problems together, work together, write in a way that makes sense to each other, etc. It's a rare thing for collabs to work, but they can.

doomwdfortune said:

I'm trying to be as involved as i can and i will admit he is doing the heavy lifting hes doing something i cant do. I'm good with ideas I'm good with coming up with sceans and situations good at characters but I'm for shit at stringing it all together into something coherent. i try to be involved but we just end up going back and forth over minor details heck we argued about hard and soft sifi for like 4 hours..in the end all i really want to know is it fair to expect that he does it my way at lest a little or should i just step back give him my characters and hope in the end i actually like it enough to read it to the end

Click to expand...

If you both want to collaborate -- where you're both writing (and plotting and etc.) -- then you're both writing the book.

As you've outlined it here, he's writing a book. What goes in it isn't yours to say (unless you've got a contract and he's gotten a check, heh).

doomwdfortune said:

I'm trying to be as involved as i can and i will admit he is doing the heavy lifting hes doing something i cant do. I'm good with ideas I'm good with coming up with sceans and situations good at characters but I'm for shit at stringing it all together into something coherent. i try to be involved but we just end up going back and forth over minor details heck we argued about hard and soft sifi for like 4 hours..in the end all i really want to know is it fair to expect that he does it my way at lest a little or should i just step back give him my characters and hope in the end i actually like it enough to read it to the end

Click to expand...

Short answer: No, it isn't fair.

Long answer: No, it really isn't fair.

doomwdfortune said:

I'm trying to be as involved as i can and i will admit he is doing the heavy lifting hes doing something i cant do. I'm good with ideas I'm good with coming up with sceans and situations good at characters but I'm for shit at stringing it all together into something coherent. i try to be involved but we just end up going back and forth over minor details heck we argued about hard and soft sifi for like 4 hours..in the end all i really want to know is it fair to expect that he does it my way at lest a little or should i just step back give him my characters and hope in the end i actually like it enough to read it to the end

Click to expand...

TBH, this has all sorts of yellow, orange, and red flags waving about it on multiple levels, from pure craft to relationship and trust and everywhere in between.

Sometimes, two people just cannot click creatively, even if they gel in other areas of life. Even if they're in love. This sounds like one of those times. Many writer collabs are strictly professional, or no more than platonic, possibly for this very reason: creative endeavors are their own beast and require their own chemistry.

For whatever reason, as this has taught you both, your visions are unlikely to mesh over this, and forcing the issue sounds like a good way to strain the rest of your relationship, the areas where you do click. (Unless this is indicative of greater communication or control issues, which I won't go near with a ten foot pole, as you know your relationship better than anyone on this board ever could.)

IMHO, it seems you have three options:

1 - Write it yourself to your own standards, even if it requires finding another writing partner.

2 - Step back and let him write it himself, to his own standards (ditto on the possibility of an outside writing partner for him, too.)

3 - Both of you give it up as a bad job and walk away, now, before either of you become more entrenched over your relative positions.

Again, IMHO, I think 3 might be the one to try, at least for now.

Collaboration, bouncing ideas off each other... it just plain doesn't seem to be working. The tools you two are bringing to the table are just incompatible. The harder you try to drive screws into a board with a hammer, the more damage you do to the screw, the hammer, and the board.

doomwdfortune said:

so be and my boyfriend have been trying work work together for a while on a story idea i had. for the most part hes agreed to be my ghost writer but in the end we've spent more time arguing then actually succeeding on getting anything done. now i know this is a bit different then a standard arrangement but still aren't ghost writes at lest somewhat beholden to the creator to try and create their vision instead of completely changing it? the original idea i had was a story set in a zombie apocalypse that would start out with a group of 3-4 girls who have to fight and survive through this, part of the story would lead to them starting a romantic relationship down the line but for the most part the main story is about them and the family theyv'y crated with each other and the things they've had to do to keep each other alive

Click to expand...

Ghostwriters write the story they're contracted to write. They don't change things to suit their needs, they just write the story.

doomwdfortune said:

I'm trying to be as involved as i can and i will admit he is doing the heavy lifting hes doing something i cant do. I'm good with ideas I'm good with coming up with sceans and situations good at characters but I'm for shit at stringing it all together into something coherent. i try to be involved but we just end up going back and forth over minor details heck we argued about hard and soft sifi for like 4 hours..in the end all i really want to know is it fair to expect that he does it my way at lest a little or should i just step back give him my characters and hope in the end i actually like it enough to read it to the end

Click to expand...

If he's ghosting your book for you then yes, it's reasonable to expect him to conform to your requests. I think he has a very different plan for this book than you have, and you need to sort this out right now.

doomwdfortune said:

nothing...i mean other then you know being a loving boyfriend.....that and half of the profits id their is any....i know i cant just be like hey im the creator your the ghost writer you do what i say and i don't want to that's why i asked him cause hes good at fixing problems in stories and stringing them together....but i kinda you know want to be able to be like hey im the creator this is how i want it done... its not a minor part of the story either its one of the big main parts of what its about

Click to expand...

He doesn't sound like a loving boyfriend to me. The arguing you describe sounds all sorts of awful, and his insisting on changing the story to suit his preferences sounds controlling. And a four hour argument about the different sorts of SF? How is that time well spent? It's abusive and horrible.

I would cancel this project. He's not going to write the book you've imagined, and it's causing the two of you to argue all the time. It's not worth it. I'd reconsider my relationship with him, too, but then I don't like spending my time arguing about nothing with controlling, abusive partners. You can do better.

ghostwriters DO write what you have agreed they will write. It sounds more like you're trying to write collaboratively, and for two people who have nil experience of writing, that's probably a terrible idea. It also sounds like you don't have roles or boundaries clearly defined.

But ultimately, even if we side with you and not him, what good will that do? Is he really going to care about the opinion of total strangers on a random internet forum?

The writing part of writing isn't "just" the heavy lifting. It's 95% of the work. I don't mean to sound harsh but ideas can be generated through a computer program.

Ghostwriters write what you want them to write, but they are paid. If someone is writing for you and isn't getting paid that's not ghostwriting. (And, quite frankly, asking someone to do that kind of work with the expectation that you'll get credit for it is manipulative and borderline abusive. It doesn't surprise me at all that y'all are having major conflicts over this.)

Having done some collaborative work in the past, I can say that working with a partner is always tricky. Inevitably someone ends up doing more of the work than the other person and it causes strain.

And, quite frankly, looking at your posts here... I'm not certain you can pull your weight on the writing front. (And yeah, it's a forum. And yeah, informal writing. But, uh, maybe work on your own story-telling skills and writing craft and then look at the idea of writing an entire book again.) I've met so many people with ideas. And ideas, for creatives, are absolutely the most constant aspect of the craft. The skill to put down page after page of compelling prose - narrative, dialog, characters, description, tension, voice, etc - is the grind. It's the thing every writer struggles with. If you are trying to put all of that work on your partner with an edict to "Write this just like I want" I'm afraid you are taking advantage.

(My relationship with my spouse does not allow for collaboration for a number of reasons. But, even if we were on good terms on that front, asking someone else to write a book for you exactly as you want it, while acknowledging that you don't have the skills to do it yourself, is... kind of a crap thing to do. The craft of storytelling is the thing that makes an idea work. Asking someone (anyone) to do that for you, while then taking credit for it... I'd be a little cranky too. [And I sympathize with the multi-hour arguments about stupid things. I've been in more than a few of those. But some of that tension and resistance may be coming from the fact that you've asked your significant other to write a fucking book for you.])

Best of luck.

From what's in this thread, it seems to me this 'arrangement' is bonkers and was doomed from the word GO.

OP, if this arrangement continues as at present, I fear you may be driving yourself into a corner and could end up with no book and no boyfriend.

Having ghostwritten a few times, I am in agreement with those who say that yes, the ghostwriter writes what is set in front of them. That is what you are paying them for. I wouldn't take a contract unless the client had a fully fleshed out plot ready to go. I would read the plot outline, ask the pertinent questions, make sure we both understood genre and genre expectations and any last minute details, then they left it in my hands to write.

That's what they paid me for.

I wrote it, turned it over to them when finished. Depending on the contract terms, I would do some edits as per request and then we handshake, I present the final bill, I get paid and I head on my happy way being $X.00 richer for it and they have a full book that they do whatever magic they want to on it.

If there is no exchange of monies, then it's a collaboration and a whole other ball of rubber bands.

Right now, I have this sort of arrangement with a friend. I provide the characters and the high concept idea to an agreed upon genre. She is writing the detailed plots, I am doing the heavy lifting of writing, then she gets it back to do the heavy lifting of editing. We have a set agreement on the division of labor and money from sales. It's all very specific and contractual.

Bufty said:

From what's in this thread, it seems to me this 'arrangement' is bonkers and was doomed from the word GO.

OP, if this arrangement continues as at present, I fear you may be driving yourself into a corner and could end up with no book and no boyfriend.

Click to expand...

Yep.

It sounds to me like you're seeing this as ghostwriting, and he's seeing it more like co-writing (or building his own story based on some of your ideas).

Either way, if you insist on continuing this as a joint project (and TBH in your shoes I'd drop it like a hot rock), I'd get a contract in place, formal or informal. The two of you need a written agreement about what this project is, who's responsible for what, and how disputes are resolved. And if you can't agree to that much...well, that tells you what you need to know right there.

As others have noted, collaboration is a particular sort of relationship. It's perfectly possible to be compatible in other areas of your lives, and still be lousy collaborators. From what you say here, you two are lousy collaborators, and it's not clear how easy it'll be to change that.

doomwdfortune said:

... all i really want to know is it fair to expect that he does it my way

Click to expand...

What does he think about that? If he doesn't agree to what you want, then that's that. Otherwise it's bunny-boiling stuff, you know.

doomwdfortune you need to have this discussion with your boyfriend, not a bunch of strangers on the Internet.