$20.00
Have you ever wondered what it really takes to become a ghostwriter—or to collaborate on a book with an expert, public figure, or client who has a powerful story but isn’t a writer?
In this WPN panel, professional ghostwriters and experienced collaborators step out from behind the scenes to talk about the craft, business, and reality of writing other people’s stories.
Whether you’re curious about ghostwriting as a new income stream, interested in collaborative nonfiction, or wondering how professional book projects are shaped behind the scenes, this panel offers a rare look into one of publishing’s most discreet—and potentially rewarding—career paths.
Free for WPN members. $20 for non-members.
Roberta Edgar is an award-winning ghostwriter and editor of fiction and nonfiction books and screenplays. Her clients range from established New York publishers to first-time authors with a wide range of backgrounds including business, academia, film, and sports.
Specialties include ghostwriting memoir, developmental editing, collaborative writing, and coaching authors to structure, grow, and build their original concept from any stage of development into finely crafted manuscripts primed for publication.
Roberta served as vice president of Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC) and booth chairperson at the LA Times Festival of Books and is currently engaged as board secretary of Writers and Publishers Network (WPN). Longtime resident of Southern California, Roberta is a member of the Writers Guild of America and the UCLA Alumni Association.
Ray Richmond has worked as entertainment journalist and author since 1984 and has worked as a television critic, columnist and reporter for a number of publications, including The Hollywood Reporter, Daily Variety, the Los Angeles Daily News, The Orange County Register and (online) Deadline Hollywood. He has interviewed many of the most famous celebrities and icons in the world, including Elizabeth Taylor, Lucille Ball, Shirley MacLaine, George Burns, Chris Rock, Martin Scorsese, Ben Stiller, Amy Schumer, Steve Carell, and Jimmy Kimmel.
Richmond is the author most recently of the bestselling coffee table biography Betty White: 100 Remarkable Moments in an Extraordinary Life that was published in December 2021 and is now in its third printing. It was also released in paperback on April 12, 2024.
His other books include the New York Times bestseller The Simpsons: A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family (1997); This is Jeopardy!: Celebrating America’s Favorite Quiz Show (2004); TV Moms: An Illustrated Guide (2000); and My Greatest Day in Show Business (1999). He has also ghostwritten and collaborated on many books, including the memoirs for the legendary actress Janis Paige (Reading Between the Lines (2020)) and character actor William Sanderson (Yes, I’m That Guy (2019)). In August 2022, he taught a graduate course in the History of Television at Chapman University in Orange, CA.
Ray was born in Whittier, California and raised in Southern California, coming of age during a time of colorful change in the region. He was graduated from Hollywood High School in 1975 and received his Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism from California State University at Northridge in 1980. He is the father of three and grandfather of two and makes his home in Valley Glen, CA.
“Claudia Suzanne,” aka Harris in the LGBTQ+ community, developed Ghostwriting Professional Designation Program, the first (and still only) ghostwriter credentialing system based on their 35+ years ghosting ~250 titles.
Dubbed “The Navy Seals of Ghostwriter Training” and “The hardest class I’ve ever taken,” GPDP won the prestigious UPCEA Outstanding Non-Credit Program Award during its thirteen-year association with California State University, Long Beach and has launched scores of professional book ghostwriter careers in the US, the UK, Scandinavia, Africa, and Australia.
They also catalogued the 58 most-common content disruptions and deal breakers—including the four “pride of” stumbling blocks that inhibit author creativity—and was the first to devise a remedy for movie/novel, or “movel,” constructions.
They’ve been called The Ghostwriting Expert, Master of the Quick and Easy Read, the Godmother and Einstein of Ghostwriters.
They’ve ghosted NYT bestsellers, National Writers Club award-winning romantic stories, pop-psych titles, true-crime exposés, business/business/business books, memoirs optioned for film, injured warrior tales, CIA confessions, blah blah blah, and yadda yadda yadda.
They also authored For Musicians Only, a NYT and Grammy Pulse bestseller with an impossible-to-remember subtitle but theoretically the first music title ever plugged on MTV; Secrets of a Ghostwriter with no subtitle; and five editions of This Business of Books with an overly long subtitle that’s nevertheless considered a “standard of the industry” in over 80 prominent libraries around the world as well as English and Chinese-speaking colleges.
They currently write the Substack “SOAG: WritingBiz Tips and Answers” and edit “SOAG: BookBiz News and Commentary.” Reconfigured GPDP content is available on Wambtac.gumroad.com. Coming soon is The Ghostwriter’s Sales Funnel: How to Land and Structure High-Value Book Projects.
Bill Grantham is a writer, researcher and lawyer based in Ireland. He was first a journalist in London and Paris, writing for publications as varied as Variety, Forbes and the Guardian. He then practiced film and television law in California for 29 years. He has worked as a ghost writer and has contributed to a television series in development as writer of its “bible” and pilot. He is currently working on a book about Hungary in the dying months of the Second World War. He is a member of BAFTA (the British Academy of Film and Television Arts), IFTA (the Irish Academy of Film and Television Arts) and the Writers Guild of Ireland.
