Blog

The coolest ghostwriting blog on the planet.

An honest email conversation about dealing with a client who wrote a problematic screenplay.

September 2, 2021June 4, 2026

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It’s time to put on my big boy pants.

August 28, 2021June 4, 2026

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We’ve begun producing our own videos!

July 31, 2021June 4, 2026

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Let’s talk about reputation and integrity.

July 27, 2021June 4, 2026

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A story about the filthiest boxing gym in New York.

April 26, 2021June 4, 2026

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Our new logo. What do you think?

April 2, 2021June 5, 2026

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The real-life word cops: Feds hoping to clarify language.

February 19, 2021June 5, 2026

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Novelists are moving into TV writers’ rooms.

February 11, 2021June 5, 2026

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There’s one wild screenplay awaiting a talented writer.

December 10, 2020June 5, 2026

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An interview with, and a new dark thriller novel by, Eric Shapiro.

October 8, 2020June 5, 2026

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Easy reading is damn hard writing.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

A true author, no matter the medium, is an artist with godlike knowledge of his subject, and the proof of his authorship is that his pages smack of authority.

Robert McKee

It begins with a character, usually, and once he stands up on his feet and begins to move, all I can do is trot along behind him with a paper and pencil, trying to keep up long enough to put down what he says and does.

William Faulkner

You may be able to take a break from writing, but you won’t be able to take a break from being a writer.

Stephen Leigh

The fact is, I don’t know where my ideas come from. Nor does any writer. The only real answer is to drink way too much coffee and buy yourself a desk that doesn’t collapse when you beat your head against it.

Douglas Adams

Stories are never too long or too short. They’re too interesting or too boring.

William Shawn

My aim is to put down what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way I can tell it.

Ernest Hemingway

A writer is a world trapped in a person.

Victor Hugo

The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.

Thomas Jefferson

Keep a small can of WD-40 on your desk — away from any open flames — to remind yourself that if you don’t write daily, you will get rusty.

George Singleton

I haven’t got 10 rules that guarantee success, though I promise I’d share them if I did. The truth is that I found success by stumbling off alone in a direction most people thought was a dead end, breaking all the 1990s shibboleths about children’s books in the process.

J.K. Rowling

If the sex scene doesn’t make you want to do it — whatever it is they’re doing — it hasn’t been written right.

Sloan Wilson

It always comes down to characters, and individual stories about courage.

Steven Bochco

It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn’t give it up because by that time I was too famous.

Robert Benchley

You can always edit a bad page. You can’t edit a blank page.

Jodi Picoult

It is perfectly okay to write garbage — as long as you edit brilliantly.

C. J. Cherryh

The first chapter sells the book; the last chapter sells the next book.

Mickey Spillane

If you haven’t got an idea, start a story anyway. You can always throw it away, and maybe by the time you get to the fourth page you will have an idea, and you’ll only have to throw away the first three pages.

William C. Gault

Ever heard of a carpenter not going to work because he has “carpenter’s block”? If a writer can’t write, it’s because he doesn’t really want to, he isn’t ready to get it on paper or he’s just plain lazy.

Chet Cunningham

What I loved most about calling myself a reporter was that it gave me an excuse to show up anyplace.