Ilisha Strassler

Ghostwriter Savannah McClelland answers all questions that aspiring writers may have.

After ghostwriter Savannah McClelland posted a rant on Facebook about the things people say about her job, General Paper teacher Mrs. Finn realized that McClelland, whom she went to school with at Santaluces, was a perfect resource for students interested in writing.

“I wanted to leave my seniors with something,” said Mrs. Finn, who is in charge of the Creative Writing club. “[Now] they can chase their dreams, especially since writing is such a hard field.”

Mrs. Finn invited McClelland to answer questions from students during Creative Writing club, which meets Mondays. She talked mostly about her writing career as a ghostwriter. Ghostwriting is a business where writers are paid to write ideas for other people, publishing the work under the client’s name.

McClelland had always been interested in writing, from storytelling as a child to getting a play published in high school. She got into ghostwriting two years ago as a way to make extra money. She is also a published writer of 6 romance novels that are under a secret name. She mainly writes romance stories but has written for other genres such as science fiction. McClelland writes about 50 novels a year and about 80,000 words a week.

For those interested in being a ghostwriter, McClelland recommended going through freelance sites like Guru.com, which can be found here. Many freelance sites and jobs have an age restriction of 18.

“Pay attention to instructions and do it,” said McClelland. “No matter how stupid it may sound.”

Writers should be wary of certain publisher scams, if the publisher offers to publish a book easily but requiresthe witer to buy their own copies, it’s most likely a scam.

Writing and lack of motivation is something every writer will go through and can get very frustrating.

“Just keep writing,” said McClelland. “Be aware that you’ll have to delete 90% of it, but you will write something that gives you inspiration.”

Ghostwriting isn’t easy. Writers can get attached to certain books but can’t take credit for your own work. It’s hard to get new clients, especially since you can’t name the books you’ve written, only the publisher you’ve worked for. However, majority of the time you can be flexible with your stories.

“Remember,” said McClelland. “Writing is as much as an obsession as it is a career.”