You’ve likely encountered a ghostwriter’s work on bookshelves at some point — but you probably don’t know it. Ghostwriters largely go unrecognized by the general reader because much of their work remains behind the scenes, often uncredited. While it can be tempting to dismiss a ghostwritten book as inauthentic, the truth is far more nuanced. Ghostwriting is a collaborative process, one where ghostwriter and credited author work together to bring an idea to life. While the author steers the creative vision, the ghostwriter uses their craft expertise to help it take shape on the page.
Today, we’re sitting down with Jason Kenny, an experienced ghostwriter. With over 25 projects under his belt, he knows firsthand how much work goes into these collaborations. Join us as Jason takes us behind the scenes into the life of a ghostwriter.
About Jason Kenny
Jason Kenny is a writer and ghostwriter. For nine years, he worked as an arts journalist, and he spent two years as an adaptation scout. After moving to Berlin in 2011, he shifted to focus on ghostwriting book manuscripts. He has worked on over 25 manuscripts spanning thought leadership and entrepreneurial memoir to genre fiction and screenplay doctoring. His approach to ghostwriting grew out of his approach to fiction — using fiction narrative structures to support authors’ stories. His ghostwritten books have found their place on top of bestseller lists, been scraped by LLMs for data, and been translated into multiple languages, including Chinese and Arabic.
Thanks for joining us, Jason! Let’s get started.
For those unfamiliar with the work you do, how does your job as a ghostwriter differ from that of a typical author?
When you consider the writer and the author as different roles — the author has the story and the experiences or insights that will make up the book, the writer has the knowledge of writing craft that will create the book — then the difference can be easier to understand. Like hiring an architect to ensure a building blueprint is sound, or hiring laborers to build it, working with a ghostwriter brings a writer’s talent to develop an author’s vision for a book. As a ghostwriter, I am a collaborator for authors.
Writing a book is a massive project with many stages to the process and different obstacles. Many would-be authors get stuck. I help authors get past these obstacles and complete the manuscript. My experience helps the author find the way to tell their story efficiently, understanding what elements need to go into the book and how to best build a book that will connect with readers.
How do a ghostwriter and an author find each other? Do authors typically begin their writing process by seeking out a ghostwriter, or is that something they choose to do along the way?
Either, actually. Some authors want to collaborate from the start. Others have been working on the book for some time until reaching a point where they want some help. Both approaches can work. In either case, we start from scratch. The writing here could be useful in clarifying what direction the book will take. Some of the work could be used to build the chapters, but it is important to begin the book from the planning stage, even if writing has started.
How is your creative process different when working towards another author’s vision, rather than on an independent project?
In many ways, the process is similar at the beginning. We start by understanding what we want the finished book to be, what it will include, what it will not be, and covering many other facets of what we are creating. Understanding this is essential. We want to be on the same page from the start. It’s a process that I also go through when writing my own books and often pick three or four titles that would be touchstones to what I’m writing. With a client, there’s further communication and clarification.
The research and outlining begin after that. When working with an author who is mostly done with interviews, I take on other research about the topic, about what has been written, about the author’s unique view, and how that will work in the book. This also includes research on the author’s voice and how the finished text will read.
How do you provide your client with professional feedback, balancing your own creative voice with the goals they have in mind?
Understanding the goal of the book is essential. Then all creative efforts will be working in the same direction. My creativity can be used in solving problems, making different parts work together, and bringing ideas to the table that will support the concepts in the book. This work draws from my creative experience rather than serving my creative voice or my own inspiration.
The morality of using AI-generated writing is a hot topic of discussion, with discourse surrounding everything from university assignments to blog posts. Considering the principle of intellectual property at the core of this debate, what would you say to someone who compared ghostwriting to such plagiarism?
The idea of taking someone else’s work and presenting it as your own is immoral; we’ve all grown up learning that and being told that at school. Ghostwriting is not that. A ghostwriter has the skills and knowledge of how to write a book and helps the author bring out the story in a way that will connect with readers. A ghostwriter is a collaborator — one of many collaborators on a book when you consider that you’ll need an editor, proofreader, layout designer, cover designer, and so on.
Your creativity has gone beyond writing and into music production for multimedia projects! How might your creative process as an artist collaborating with another artist be similar to (or different from) your creative process as an author working with another author?
I’ve created soundtracks and original music to accompany work by visual artists, theatre and film directors, and producers. Understanding the intent of the work and how the music should support that is similar to ghostwriting a book. I’ve collaborated on over ten works with a Finnish artist, and finding a way to use music and sound to reflect her intent in her sculptures or videos is a fun challenge. In both cases, it’s a form of translation or adaptation, taking an idea from one medium to support another. The process also shares a similar element of investing ideas and energy to truly focus on the work and what we’re trying to achieve together.
With a solid foundation at the core of every well-written book, how do you manage the changing opinions and new revelations of the other author involved in your work?
This happens on different levels. It can be difficult when an author changes their concept of the book. There are times it develops and grows to something else — that can be exciting. But when an author isn’t actually ready to commit to a book, there can be the tendency to change ideas and concepts constantly instead of digging into the work of what we’ve already outlined.
There’s also the fact that not everything can go in the book. When the work is particularly well structured, everything has a purpose. Everything adds up to build upon what else is there. Sometimes, something else comes along and adds a new angle or a new idea that just needs to be included. Other times, it’s important to understand that it doesn’t fit in the overall structure. It might be a founding piece of another book. It might be something shorter, like a blog or article.
To close out, how do you feel about the anonymity of your work? Reading the final product of a ghostwriting project, do you recognize your own voice as an author in the book?
It is a strange feeling — not always the voice, but recognizing where I have decided to phrase parts in a certain way. There’s a memory of writing the words, even if it’s not me. I have always loved writing, and I have since a young age. The anonymity is not a problem for me. I’ve worked as a journalist, as a copywriter, as a scriptwriter, and as a literary scout — it’s always the long form writing that most excites me. Being able to help someone else bring out their ideas and create a book with them is a lot of fun and a great way to be able to write. And it gives me the opportunity to write about a lot of topics that I otherwise wouldn’t.
Thanks again to Jason for speaking with us! If you’re interested in working with him, you can visit his website or connect with him on LinkedIn.
Click here to read our interview with journalist Martha Barnett.
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