Have you ever wondered how some authors can seem to turn out a novel about every twenty minutes? Take a look at Amazon and you will see one author in particular who has three novels currently going at once. There is also a famous female author who is a prolific writer.
I know how long it takes to write a 300 page novel and it is humanly impossible for these authors to be churning out so much material in so short a time. So how do they do it? What is their secret?
I know this may disillusion you, but do you care? If you enjoy their books will it make you less of a fan if I break their balloon? Is it going to make you avoid buying their books? No, not a chance. So here goes.
The secret is: They, that is the author themselves, DO NOT write their books. One extremely popular author uses acolytes or interns or writing students or just plain fans to do the dirty work. He gives them an outline, and since his books are primarily formula plots, they know how to emulate his style. And when they turn in their complete manuscripts, he does a little editing, puts his name on it, pays them off, and has another best seller.
The female author I referred to above at one time had a staff of 30 or 40 people working for her. Again, they followed her outline and style and churned out reams of material. She had, on one occasion, so many “novels” in the works, she had to hold them back and time their release so it would not appear so obvious that she was not writing the books herself.
Is this an unfair way to treat your reading audience? I don’t know. It is certainly not unethical. They run their “business” like any other mass-production concern. They use “helpers” much the same as any assembly line business operates. And since they have become wealthy using this technique, they can afford to hire a staff to do the hard work of writing their novels for them.
I put this in the same category as something else you sometimes see. In my area, periodically there will be a “Starving Artist’s Sale.” A distribution company will hire the ball room of a motel and customers can come in and buy reproductions of famous paintings in oils or acrylics or water colors (whatever medium the original artist used) to decorate their living room walls. These are not touted as “originals” so there is no fraud involved, they are “reproductions.” But these paintings are turned out by a room full of artists all copying well known paintings. One day it will be Picasso’s, the next may be Chagall’s, or Rembrandt’s or whatever.
The authors who use staff writers are certainly not starving, and their method of turning out product is successful so why should they change? They give their readers what the reader expects, and what difference does it make if every word did not originate in the mind of the author whose name appears on the cover? I’ll leave the right or wrong of this method up to you.
johnbeckmanbooks 