Ghostwrite Your First Draft in 30 Days!

If you’re properly prepared, you can ghostwrite the first draft of a nonfiction manuscript in thirty days. Planning a book that’s shorter than full-length will make this goal a lot easier, but you can ghost a full-length first draft in a month if you’re highly organized, have ninety percent of the content you need and can devote forty to fifty hours a week to writing.

I won’t kid you. To reach this goal, you’ll need to maintain your focus, stick to your writing schedule and hit or exceed your daily deadlines. So if this is your first book, I highly recommend that you keep the word count between 25,000 and 35,000 words. That’s a much more obtainable goal than a full-length book and will allow you time for those little necessities like sleep and food.

GET READY!

Crystallize the Author’s Intentions

Together with the author:

• Craft a purpose statement for the book clearly stating what the book will do for readers. The more specific you are, the more focused you’ll be while researching, conducting interviews and gathering content.
• Describe the book’s target market. Who will read this book and why? Knowing the audience will help you to write the best book for those readers.
• Write one crystal-clear sentence summarizing the book’s primary concept, idea or goal.
• List the primary points the book will make and/or the main ideas that the author will share.

Organize the author’s thoughts

• Draft the table of contents. Start by reviewing the primary points and putting them in the order that will make the most sense to readers. What do they need to learn or understand first? What’s the closing point or idea that the author wants to share in the book? How do the other points logically fit in between? Once you have the organizational structure in mind, you can create the table of contents. Try to make each chapter about the same length. No need to decide on chapter titles yet—you can do that in the second draft. For now, give each chapter a label that clearly summarizes what the chapter is about.
• Ask the author to review the table of contents and give you feedback.

Organization Is Your Best Friend

Create a folder and name it the title of the book. Within this main folder, establish an organizational structure for keeping track of everything as you write the manuscript. Here’s what my organizational system looks like:

Main Folder: Book Title

Folders Inside:

Front and Back Material

Folders Inside:

Table of Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Closing Note to Readers

Resources

References

Appendices

 

Chapters (one folder for each chapter)

 Folders Inside:

Ch 1 Outline With Content

Ch 1 Material

Folders Inside:

Ch 1 Research & References

Ch 1 Interview Questions and Transcripts

Ch 1 First Draft

Folders Inside

Ch 1 First Draft

Ch 1 Old Drafts

Ch 1 Worksheets

Ch 1 Additional Material

 

Logistics and Schedule

Folders Inside:

Author & Publisher Contact Information

Author Agreement & Communication

Publishing Contract & Communication

Production Schedule & Calendars

Financial Communication & Records

 

Full Manuscript

Folders Inside:

First Draft Manuscript (date)

Second Draft Manuscript (date)

Final Manuscript (date)

GET SET!

Construct an Outline for Each Chapter

• You don’t need to do this with the standard I, II, III, A, B, C structure unless you like doing outlines that way. I prefer outlines that are a little looser. My chapter outlines are usually three or four primary points. Under each primary point, I create a bullet list of what we’ll cover.
• Make sure the primary points and bullet-list items are in the order that will make the most sense to your readers.
• Have the author review the outlines and let you know if there are primary points or supporting points that are missing and if there are any points that you’ve included that he or she would rather not cover.
• Together, finalize the table of contents and chapter outlines.

Gather & Organize the Content

• Determine how the author will provide you with the content for each primary and supporting point or concept. Typically, the more written material the author can provide you, the better. Decide how the other content will be gathered. Will you be doing the research or will there be a researcher to support you? Will you be doing recorded interviews? If so, line up your transcriptionist now.
• File content, research and interview transcripts in the appropriate folders as you obtain them. Do not, under any circumstances, create a folder called “Stuff to File.

Create an Outline With Content for Each Chapter

The Outlines With Content documents will contain the material you need to write the first draft of each chapter.

• Copy and paste the outline for each chapter into a new document. Change the outline to boldface and increase the font size to make the outline stand out from the text you’re going to insert. (This will make it easier to navigate the document.)
• Copy and paste the material and stories for each chapter into the appropriate places in the chapter outline.
• Ask the author to review the Outlines With Content. If there is additional material that the author wants you to include in the first draft, decide how and when he or she will provide you with this information.

GO!

Schedule Writing Time

• Reserve two days to draft the book’s front and back material: dedication, acknowledgments, introduction, and summary or closing note. That leaves twenty-eight days.
• Divide the number of chapters in the book by twenty-eight to determine how many days you can devote to each chapter draft. For example, if the book has fourteen chapters, you’ll have two days to write each chapter.

Sprint Your First Draft

Your goal for the first draft is to turn your content into writing that your readers will understand. Your goal is not to nail the voice or make it read beautifully. Those issues should be addressed in the second draft. So spare yourself a lot of grief and don’t share the first-draft chapters with the author. Begin sharing the manuscript with the author when you’ve completed the second drafts for the first one or two chapters.

• Approach the upcoming thirty days like an exhilarating race. See how fast your mind can move and your fingers can type. One of the most awesome benefits of sprinting the first draft is that it doesn’t leave much time or space for your inner critic to interfere.
• If you realize that you’re missing content, don’t stop writing to find it. Just make a note that says something like “Get this info for second draft.” If you have specific ideas of what you’re looking for, write a comment using the tracking tool and then move on.
• Stand up and stretch, skip, dance, or do jumping jacks frequently. It will keep your energy high, your mind engaged and your body happy.
• Do something lovely for yourself at the close of each writing day.

Have fun! And let me know if you’d like some support. While ghosting more than a dozen books, I’ve developed creative solutions for just about every challenge you can encounter along the way.

 

About the Author

Toni Robino is one of North America’s most sought-after “ghosts” for leading publishers, with titles on the New York Times best-seller list. In addition to ghostwriting, Toni teaches nonfiction writers how to write their best book. Windword’s comprehensive and customized course for conceptualizing and crafting award-winning books is private, personalized and exactly what most writers need in order to become published authors. Toni coaches experienced ghosts who run into challenges and teaches new ghosts how to start their businesses and ghost their first books. To set up your free discovery session, call Toni at 646-369-0156. http://www.windwordliteraryservices.com/our-work

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