00:00Okay Lisa I'm ready for you. Do you think this article was ghostwritten? I'm pretty
00:05sure it was. I only asked because I was at this book release party and I was
00:13casually talking to the woman next to me at the bar and after a few minutes of
00:17back-and-forth I was like so what do you do and she said I wrote the book we're
00:22celebrating. I said but you're not the author and then she said I'm the ghost
00:26writer. I was shocked so I asked her do you mind not getting any of the credit
00:32for your work and she said not as long as my name is on the check. Ghostwriting is
00:36a pretty ballsy career choice you do all the work but you don't get any of the
00:42fame the press or the praise I mean that's kind of the best part of writing a
00:46book right the fame. How else are you gonna meet Oprah? Now you all know I love a good
00:51book. New York Times best-selling author. The next big thing in literature. Ghostwriting
00:55fascinates me because throughout history in every industry women have done a
01:01lot of the work but haven't exactly gotten the credit for it. Study after
01:05study after study shows that women get less credit than men in the workplace as
01:09if you needed a study to tell you that but female ghostwriters are essentially
01:13monetizing this dynamic of doing all of the work and not getting any of the
01:17credit and they are making bank. So obviously I had to reach out to a ghost
01:22writer to find out more. So I sat down with New York Times and Amazon best-selling
01:27ghostwriter Jodi Lipper.
01:34Throughout history women have done the majority of the work but not gotten the
01:38credit and their studies to show that this happens still today. How does that
01:42affect you in your industry because I feel like that's such a unique position for
01:45you. Yeah. In ghostwriting. Well first of all I work with a lot of female authors. I
01:50also work with a lot of authors who are people of color and I really make an
01:53effort to find those people and help get their voices out there. That's really
01:57important to me. So I feel good about that. Some of the male ghostwriters who are at
02:01the top of the field do fight more for cover credit with so-and-so. More so than
02:07some of the top female ghostwriters and this is really a female dominated field. A lot
02:11of the top writers out there are women. The men that I talk to the most that are in
02:15this field don't call themselves ghostwriters at all. What do they call
02:18themselves? Collaborative writers or co-writers and they're the ones who more
02:22often do get credit. So how about how many books do you write a year? What's like an
02:26average number? I'd say the average has been about two to three. That's amazing.
02:31So you're banging out two to three a year. Yeah. Do you get credit for that number
02:35of books because that's a lot of writing. No I get paid for each one but that's it.
02:40So of the New York Times bestseller list how many are ghostwritten would you say?
02:45You don't have to name names. For nonfiction I would say almost all. Probably.
02:50Yeah. I think most people would be shocked but within the industry it's not a
02:54secret at all. People know that anyone with a big enough platform to sell that
02:59many books they've got a lot of help. One thing that fascinates me about
03:03ghostwriting is that women have monetized the idea of doing all of the work
03:07but getting none of the credit. Are you guys making bank? If you want a very
03:11experienced ghostwriter who's going to deliver something that's really polished
03:14and ready to be published it's gonna cost you. And to me it's not about getting
03:19credit and having my name on the book it's about knowing that I've helped them
03:22tell their story. I feel that I get credit for my contributions by the author, by
03:28the editor, by the people who know what I do and who work with me. My brand is not
03:33having a brand. My brand is being able to capture other authors' voices so I think
03:38that's a big part of actually the skill set of being a ghostwriter is that
03:41ability to connect with different people because you have to earn that trust.
03:46Your brand is anti-brand. My brand is anti-brand. I don't feel the need to have
03:49like a public brand. Right. What's the hot gossip in the ghostwriter network?
03:55The hot gossip is really how can we elevate this profession. Some ghostwriters would
04:00say that we have the hardest job in the publishing industry. We have to make the
04:05author happy. We have to make the editor happy. And if there's ever a conflict
04:09between an editor and an author or an agent and an author the ghostwriter can
04:15get caught in the middle and kind of blamed if things go downhill. And that is
04:19definitely a negative side to this job. So that's probably the biggest gossip is
04:27just how can we elevate this and protect ourselves so that we have more control
04:31over our lives and our careers and we're not kind of getting thrown under the bus
04:35if someone else doesn't do their job. So what advice would you give for young
04:39women who want to be writers but don't necessarily know what path to take to
04:43make that a sustainable career choice? I would just want them to know that this
04:47is an option. It's something that people don't really know about because it is so
04:51secret and hidden. But meanwhile it's a lucrative career that's I would say
04:56strictly creative. It's just writing. That's something that's really important
05:00for women who want a career. As a kid I had such anxiety about not being able to
05:05finish an entire series of my favorite book. And now I know why. There was a new
05:11Babysitter's Club book every other week with the help of how was I gonna read all of
05:17the Sweet Valley High books. Francine Pascal was putting out 181 books with the
05:22help of... So this week I had back-to-back meetings, a ton of emails to respond to,
05:27and a presentation to give. So guess what I did? How's that going? She's great but I
05:34never see her.
