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Ghosting: A Double Life
When Jennie Erdal was hired to edit a flamboyant London publisher’s Russian books in translation, she was happy to be able to commute from her home in Scotland. Soon, however, she was also secretly writing her boss’s love letters, hundreds of newspaper columns that appeared in his name, and, though she had never before written fiction, his two well-reviewed novels. For more than fifteen years she would be the indispensable ghostwriter for the exasperating, obsessive, but nontheless charming “Tiger.”Erdal reveals this oddly intimate relationship with a novelist’s flair for character and observation--and wry insight into her own collusion. Suspenseful, controversial, and beautifully written, Ghosting is the most penetrating portrait yet of a mysterious profession.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
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November 28, 2010
A couple of years ago I dabbled in some ghostwriting. It was very different from editing, and not an experience I greatly enjoyed. I felt like a bit of a fake, and my pride, I have to admit, was rather hurt when the book came out and I received none of the praise.
My experience has very little to do with Jennie Erdal's. For nearly 20 years she was an editor at London publisher Quartet Books. Originally employed to manage the Russian list, she gradually moved into the role of ghostwriter, servicing the flamboyant head of the publishing house, Tiger, writing everything from his love letters to his novels.
Parts of the book play out like 1980s sparkly excess - Tiger surrounds himself with longstemmed young ladies plucked from the lower aristocracy, with names like Cosima and Nigella and Samantha, whose primary roles are to been seen at the right parties. He owns the first car phone Erdal has ever seen, and uses it chiefly on the way to the airport, to remind people he has it. He is hysterical, excitable, enthusiastic, bloody-minded, incredible.
These seem to be the bits of the book other readers enjoy - Erdal's trials and tribulations and trips and tiffs with Tiger.
Interspersed with these tales are stories from her own childhood and observations on writing. These are the bits other people find boring. Admittedly, they don't have the sparkle of Tiger's world - they are the dour Scottish porridge to his aromatic Mediterranean truffle. But they detail the ambivalence she has always felt about language, an ambivalence that became more and more complex as she spent more and more of her life turning Tiger's (often strange, occasionally pervy) idea nuggets into fully-fledged books.
Growing up in Scotland, Erdal was hyper aware of the place language held in her family. At the age of five she was sent to elocution lessons - but simultaneously disparaged for talking like Lady Muck at home. Some words were allowed (bottom) and some forbidden (bum) - seemingly at random. Her mother had her everyday voice and her visit-from-the-church-elders voice, a distinction as rigidly enforced as the towels in the bathroom that were just for show - never for the family to use. Erdal writes of her happiness in the visits of an old family friend, whose storytelling brings the dinnaes and cannaes and winnaes back into the household, along with a sense of comfort and ease that is usually lacking: when he leaves after a visit she tries to continue the mood by using his words, but is swiftly shut down.
This is Erdal's first book under her own name. It's very enjoyable, if occasionally squirm-worthy: that's mainly the excerpts from the sex scenes she had to realise from Tiger's rather feverish erotic imagination. More than anything, Erdal has an observant eye and a deft touch. Here she describes the scene after the family's weekly baths, when her father has made the sprint from the bathroom back to the kitchen:
My experience has very little to do with Jennie Erdal's. For nearly 20 years she was an editor at London publisher Quartet Books. Originally employed to manage the Russian list, she gradually moved into the role of ghostwriter, servicing the flamboyant head of the publishing house, Tiger, writing everything from his love letters to his novels.
Parts of the book play out like 1980s sparkly excess - Tiger surrounds himself with longstemmed young ladies plucked from the lower aristocracy, with names like Cosima and Nigella and Samantha, whose primary roles are to been seen at the right parties. He owns the first car phone Erdal has ever seen, and uses it chiefly on the way to the airport, to remind people he has it. He is hysterical, excitable, enthusiastic, bloody-minded, incredible.
These seem to be the bits of the book other readers enjoy - Erdal's trials and tribulations and trips and tiffs with Tiger.
Interspersed with these tales are stories from her own childhood and observations on writing. These are the bits other people find boring. Admittedly, they don't have the sparkle of Tiger's world - they are the dour Scottish porridge to his aromatic Mediterranean truffle. But they detail the ambivalence she has always felt about language, an ambivalence that became more and more complex as she spent more and more of her life turning Tiger's (often strange, occasionally pervy) idea nuggets into fully-fledged books.
Growing up in Scotland, Erdal was hyper aware of the place language held in her family. At the age of five she was sent to elocution lessons - but simultaneously disparaged for talking like Lady Muck at home. Some words were allowed (bottom) and some forbidden (bum) - seemingly at random. Her mother had her everyday voice and her visit-from-the-church-elders voice, a distinction as rigidly enforced as the towels in the bathroom that were just for show - never for the family to use. Erdal writes of her happiness in the visits of an old family friend, whose storytelling brings the dinnaes and cannaes and winnaes back into the household, along with a sense of comfort and ease that is usually lacking: when he leaves after a visit she tries to continue the mood by using his words, but is swiftly shut down.
This is Erdal's first book under her own name. It's very enjoyable, if occasionally squirm-worthy: that's mainly the excerpts from the sex scenes she had to realise from Tiger's rather feverish erotic imagination. More than anything, Erdal has an observant eye and a deft touch. Here she describes the scene after the family's weekly baths, when her father has made the sprint from the bathroom back to the kitchen:
The scene was sombre but curiously edifying, a kind of Victorian death-bed moment. My father, now dry, would go to a corner of the kitchen, turn his back on us, drop his towel and bend down to step into his pyjamas. This was the moment worth waiting for, the fascination and appallingness of it undiminishised by its weekly repetition. For there, hanging down between my father's legs, was a sort of pouch, loose and macerated like an oven-ready bird and, to make matters worse, there was another bit, peeping out from the base of the pouch, a pink dangly thing. When my father raised first one leg, then the other, to enter his pyjamas, the pink dangly thing moved as if it had a life independent of my father's bare body. No one ever said anything. The wrinkled arrangement between his legs was clearly some unspeakable deformity, which my father to his etneral shame had to endure. I felt sorry for him, and sometimes when he was angry with me I made allowances for him because of his misfortune.
September 30, 2024
Una memoria chistosa, sentida y casi, casi tirando a maravillosa. ¿Qué es lo que pasa por la mente de un escritor fantasma? ¿Qué relación guarda con su trabajo? ¿Cómo concibe y cómo siente una historia que ultimadamente será comercializada como hecha por alguien más?
Jennie Erdal vivió veinte años como la escritora fantasma del extravagante magnate editorial Naim Attalah, a quien llama simplemente ‘Tigre’. Un individuo caprichoso, bombástico, exagerado y con ciertas inclinaciones que hoy día provocarían que lo llamasen ‘viejo cochino’. De inventarse preguntas para entrevistar a escribir columnas e incluso un par de novelas picosas. Y al mismo tiempo enfrentarse a un doloroso divorcio y a la reconstrucción de su vida.
Esta memoria es, creo, la única que narra cómo piensa un escritor que debe escribir para alguien más, con la perspectiva de un tercero que se llevará el reconocimiento. Debe representar cierto tipo de disociación, que Erdal narra con maravillosas citas sobre la función del escritor. Al final, desacuerdos sobre el rol de la ficción, de la dinámica de los personajes y desencuentros sobre cómo entender una historia terminarían rompiendo esta relación con el famoso Tigre.
Recomendada.
Jennie Erdal vivió veinte años como la escritora fantasma del extravagante magnate editorial Naim Attalah, a quien llama simplemente ‘Tigre’. Un individuo caprichoso, bombástico, exagerado y con ciertas inclinaciones que hoy día provocarían que lo llamasen ‘viejo cochino’. De inventarse preguntas para entrevistar a escribir columnas e incluso un par de novelas picosas. Y al mismo tiempo enfrentarse a un doloroso divorcio y a la reconstrucción de su vida.
Esta memoria es, creo, la única que narra cómo piensa un escritor que debe escribir para alguien más, con la perspectiva de un tercero que se llevará el reconocimiento. Debe representar cierto tipo de disociación, que Erdal narra con maravillosas citas sobre la función del escritor. Al final, desacuerdos sobre el rol de la ficción, de la dinámica de los personajes y desencuentros sobre cómo entender una historia terminarían rompiendo esta relación con el famoso Tigre.
Recomendada.
July 25, 2009
So...I feel quite justified in my book cover prejudice because this book has a mediocre cover and complementary content. Ghosting is the 20 year memoir of a ghostwriter and the flamboyant publishing playboy she wrote for. During the course of their relationship they developed a somewhat odd symbiosis. Erdal learned to cope with Tiger (as she calls her employer) and his outlandish personality and persnickety habits. She wrote at least 3 books under his name along with letters, reviews, and columns.
The concept of ghostwriting is definitely interesting and controversial and Erdal gives a great peak into the process of writing as someone else, as well as, the writing process in general. Where the book (which is fairly short) failed was in 1. structure--going back and forth between the psychology of her upbringing and her personal relationships, a character studies of Tiger and her writing process. It felt very disjointed. 2. High falutin' writing. While her writing style was mostly accessible she kept throwing in latin phrases and other references which were further made the story disjointed. One or two sine qua non would have been enough I think. 3.Sometimes I just didn't believe or understand Tiger as she explained him.
Anyway...here's a lesson for all of you: judge books by their cover
The concept of ghostwriting is definitely interesting and controversial and Erdal gives a great peak into the process of writing as someone else, as well as, the writing process in general. Where the book (which is fairly short) failed was in 1. structure--going back and forth between the psychology of her upbringing and her personal relationships, a character studies of Tiger and her writing process. It felt very disjointed. 2. High falutin' writing. While her writing style was mostly accessible she kept throwing in latin phrases and other references which were further made the story disjointed. One or two sine qua non would have been enough I think. 3.Sometimes I just didn't believe or understand Tiger as she explained him.
Anyway...here's a lesson for all of you: judge books by their cover
July 18, 2022
Jennie Erdal, a Scottish translator of Russian books, and a ghostwriter for the man she calls "Tiger," who ran a publishing company and a conglomerate of other companies, spent 15 years, from 1981 to 1998, working for and with Tiger, translating Russian books, and also ghostwriting books Tiger published under his own name, two novels, a 1200 page book called Asking Questions, which was a series of interviews with famous women, and a newspaper column, as well as writing all of his correspondence, including his love letters. Erdal is a married young mother when she comes into he headiness of London in the 80s, with the flamboyant Tiger, whose name she never reveals in the memoir, with the gorgeous well-connected girls he hired, with the carnival atmosphere and infighting among his all-female staff. Mixed in with this is Erdal's childhood, born in Fife, elocution lessons and more. For years she lived this double life, between London and Scotland, as her marriage broke up. Least interesting are the publishing details, or the writing of sex scenes for Tiger's book. It was strange that she never named him in the book, still it was a poignant memoir to read.
January 12, 2020
This entertaining memoir of an employee-employer relationship is also greatly puzzling. It centres round an unnamed publisher that Jennie Erdal worked for: in the book he is consistently called Tiger. However, at the back there are acknowledgements and any reader can easily deduce that the man must have been Naim Attallah. So why not name him in the memoir?
It is certainly an interesting relationship that Tiger and Erdal had, and it lasted for about twenty years. This is all cleverly described. Tiger was a flamboyant man and there is page after page of description of his habits. However, there is little about Erdal's own feelings towards her employer. Did she find him fascinating or ridiculous? In some scenes it is possible to guess but it would be good to know - she remains very opaque. The book was obviously written after Attallah sold up in London and moved away to France, that is, with hindsight; it is also not a diary. So she may not know or remember what she felt at first and towards the end she may have been truly exasperated. This is hinted but not spelt out. I for one would have wanted to know why, living in Scotland, she started working for him in London - she must have been fascinated by the man - and why she accepted the job of ghosting two novels if she found it so difficult.
Novel writing involved also sex scenes that she agonised over. She has described in some detail the pressure Tiger put her under. There is no explanation why she succumbed to his demands. For a man who loved women, employed pretty young women, talked about sex, insisted on naked swimming, there is merely a hint buried somewhere that he was married. The memoir does not mention the wife. Did Erdal not meet her in all this time? Erdal also wrote erotic pieces to be published under his name. So what kind of a relationship did this employer and employee have?
Having been puzzled by the purpose of the book, I cannot praise it highly enough for its observations on writing and translating. These are indeed interesting and a joy to read. But the prose is excellent throughout.
It is certainly an interesting relationship that Tiger and Erdal had, and it lasted for about twenty years. This is all cleverly described. Tiger was a flamboyant man and there is page after page of description of his habits. However, there is little about Erdal's own feelings towards her employer. Did she find him fascinating or ridiculous? In some scenes it is possible to guess but it would be good to know - she remains very opaque. The book was obviously written after Attallah sold up in London and moved away to France, that is, with hindsight; it is also not a diary. So she may not know or remember what she felt at first and towards the end she may have been truly exasperated. This is hinted but not spelt out. I for one would have wanted to know why, living in Scotland, she started working for him in London - she must have been fascinated by the man - and why she accepted the job of ghosting two novels if she found it so difficult.
Novel writing involved also sex scenes that she agonised over. She has described in some detail the pressure Tiger put her under. There is no explanation why she succumbed to his demands. For a man who loved women, employed pretty young women, talked about sex, insisted on naked swimming, there is merely a hint buried somewhere that he was married. The memoir does not mention the wife. Did Erdal not meet her in all this time? Erdal also wrote erotic pieces to be published under his name. So what kind of a relationship did this employer and employee have?
Having been puzzled by the purpose of the book, I cannot praise it highly enough for its observations on writing and translating. These are indeed interesting and a joy to read. But the prose is excellent throughout.
Want to read
September 12, 2018Reading the Slightly Foxed Editions No. 43 released September 2018.
December 5, 2024
A very enjoyable and unexpected read.
May 25, 2013
Jennie Erdal had, for fifteen years, what I consider to have been one of the most intriguing jobs ever. During the eighties and nineties she worked for Quartet Books as an editor and translator. She was there in the early and mid eighties, a time of excess. I love the descriptions of the “girls” who worked there, mostly from wealthy backgrounds - always beautiful and beautifully dressed. She remained until the late 90s when money was scarce and the world had changed, with publishing houses now struggling to make a living. In between these times Erdal takes us on a wonderful journey from her childhood in Scotland to the glitz and glamour of London with retreats to a house in the Dordogne (which I would have loved to have seen).
What I really enjoyed about this book was Erdal’s clear and elegant style of writing and her obvious intelligence which shines through on every page. What I also noticed, when reading other reviews, is that mostly people didn’t seem to appreciate the humour in the book. I was in fits of laughter when the 10 year old Jennie is accosted by what she thinks is a man pulling a skinned rabbit out of his pants. She is bemused and and startled but it is her parents’ reaction to the scene that actually leaves her upset.
It was interesting to learn that her parents, particularly her mother, were on occasion ashamed of their native Scots accent and would often change their way of speaking when visitors were in the house. As a result, from a very early age, Erdal didn’t trust the English language and became driven to learn one language after another, as if the answers to life might be available in another language instead of English. Her knowledge of Russian led to her job as editor/translator and eventually ghostwriter for Naim Attalah of Quartet Books, known only as Tiger in Ghosting.
Here are snippets of Tiger and is world:
“Arriving in Tiger’s publishing house for the first time was like turning up in someone else’s dream....It felt high voltage and slightly dangerous....”At the palace there was a retinue of attendants - valets, scribes, equerries, foot messengers, maidservants, not to mention a chamberlain figure, who had the difficult job of balancing the books.”
Of Attalah Erdal writes:
There were at least two Tigers: one was the exotic, flamboyant, quixotic, loveable character, defined by his generosity, compassion and energy; the other was a vainglorious dictator. The latter was generally in the shadow of the former, but both versions were real.”
I love this short description: “Like fine wine, and cats in baskets, he did not travel well.” And her description of him using his mobile phone! He had acquired one of the earliest versions and was constantly on it, particularly in the back of a taxi. As Erdal says so eloquently:
“And in the back seat I experienced the first stirrings of those feelings now common among travellers whose basic entitlement to peace and quiet is being violated. I had no idea then that within twenty years a billion people would be jabbering into mobiles.”
But for the most part, of course, this book is about Erdal’s struggles to live with her profession - the difficulty of writing whilst pretending to write as a man when you are a woman; to write a book about something that is not your idea or is not what you want to write (which is something I know I would find impossible to do) and lastly how she dealt with living a life that ultimately was not her own. Highly recommended.
What I really enjoyed about this book was Erdal’s clear and elegant style of writing and her obvious intelligence which shines through on every page. What I also noticed, when reading other reviews, is that mostly people didn’t seem to appreciate the humour in the book. I was in fits of laughter when the 10 year old Jennie is accosted by what she thinks is a man pulling a skinned rabbit out of his pants. She is bemused and and startled but it is her parents’ reaction to the scene that actually leaves her upset.
It was interesting to learn that her parents, particularly her mother, were on occasion ashamed of their native Scots accent and would often change their way of speaking when visitors were in the house. As a result, from a very early age, Erdal didn’t trust the English language and became driven to learn one language after another, as if the answers to life might be available in another language instead of English. Her knowledge of Russian led to her job as editor/translator and eventually ghostwriter for Naim Attalah of Quartet Books, known only as Tiger in Ghosting.
Here are snippets of Tiger and is world:
“Arriving in Tiger’s publishing house for the first time was like turning up in someone else’s dream....It felt high voltage and slightly dangerous....”At the palace there was a retinue of attendants - valets, scribes, equerries, foot messengers, maidservants, not to mention a chamberlain figure, who had the difficult job of balancing the books.”
Of Attalah Erdal writes:
There were at least two Tigers: one was the exotic, flamboyant, quixotic, loveable character, defined by his generosity, compassion and energy; the other was a vainglorious dictator. The latter was generally in the shadow of the former, but both versions were real.”
I love this short description: “Like fine wine, and cats in baskets, he did not travel well.” And her description of him using his mobile phone! He had acquired one of the earliest versions and was constantly on it, particularly in the back of a taxi. As Erdal says so eloquently:
“And in the back seat I experienced the first stirrings of those feelings now common among travellers whose basic entitlement to peace and quiet is being violated. I had no idea then that within twenty years a billion people would be jabbering into mobiles.”
But for the most part, of course, this book is about Erdal’s struggles to live with her profession - the difficulty of writing whilst pretending to write as a man when you are a woman; to write a book about something that is not your idea or is not what you want to write (which is something I know I would find impossible to do) and lastly how she dealt with living a life that ultimately was not her own. Highly recommended.
January 3, 2013
So far, absolutely fascinating!
Finished now, did not want it to end... This skilled writer, Jennie Erdal, really held my attention, and not only because her autobiographical book centers around interesting revelations from her years of ghost-writing for a well-known London publisher. While the Scottish mother of 3 young children, she had translated some important Russian works. Being in the right place at the right time, she developed his trust in her abilities, which gradually led to supporting his ego, and ghosting, with occasional trips to London and southern France.
Her sensitive consideration for others' feelings is evident throughout the book. She treats all manner of occurrences with such articulate literary style; her carefully constructed discussions on the writing process itself warrant note-taking & discussion. A brief section on her upbringing in Scotland, complete with elocution lessons and anti-Papist propaganda from her family, should be expanded into its own book. I hope it will be.
As life progressed, some elements in her family and job must have been quite difficult to deal with and, even years later, to describe. She handled these stresses so well! Detailing the numerous, ludicrous demands made by her boss, "Tiger," she chose varied, sometimes clipped, British terms, delivered with delightful, understated spareness. His dictatorial mode was almost unconsciously funny, while Ms. Erdal was ever uncomplaining... but never oblivious. She remained, still keeping secrets and philosophical, long after what most would call "the last straw." Way toward the end, she used the word "lies" quite judiciously, & effectively. My impression is that she still maintains her friendship with Tiger.
Even for a few distasteful topics, her descriptions could not have been more masterful! Wish more authors wrote as well, and will look for more of her writings... under her own name!
Finished now, did not want it to end... This skilled writer, Jennie Erdal, really held my attention, and not only because her autobiographical book centers around interesting revelations from her years of ghost-writing for a well-known London publisher. While the Scottish mother of 3 young children, she had translated some important Russian works. Being in the right place at the right time, she developed his trust in her abilities, which gradually led to supporting his ego, and ghosting, with occasional trips to London and southern France.
Her sensitive consideration for others' feelings is evident throughout the book. She treats all manner of occurrences with such articulate literary style; her carefully constructed discussions on the writing process itself warrant note-taking & discussion. A brief section on her upbringing in Scotland, complete with elocution lessons and anti-Papist propaganda from her family, should be expanded into its own book. I hope it will be.
As life progressed, some elements in her family and job must have been quite difficult to deal with and, even years later, to describe. She handled these stresses so well! Detailing the numerous, ludicrous demands made by her boss, "Tiger," she chose varied, sometimes clipped, British terms, delivered with delightful, understated spareness. His dictatorial mode was almost unconsciously funny, while Ms. Erdal was ever uncomplaining... but never oblivious. She remained, still keeping secrets and philosophical, long after what most would call "the last straw." Way toward the end, she used the word "lies" quite judiciously, & effectively. My impression is that she still maintains her friendship with Tiger.
Even for a few distasteful topics, her descriptions could not have been more masterful! Wish more authors wrote as well, and will look for more of her writings... under her own name!
November 3, 2015
2004
This book was definitely entertaining for at least the first half. After that, it got rather repetitive. The flamboyant publisher/boss keeps on, but the author's [or protagonist's] understanding of him does not seem to evolve much after that.
More intriguing to me would have been if the author had explored much deeper why she continued to be so drawn to his outrageous personality and behavior. Twenty years, for goodness sake! But probably she can't explain herself to herself [and most of us can't]. Charisma [if this is the right word for what this man had] is probably a slippery thing to get a handle on.
But the first half really is nice to read. I was glad for her snippets about her childhood; there could have been more of that, for my taste.
MICHAEL GLENNY WAS THE FINEST TRANSLATOR OF RUSSIAN LITERATURE, p 77
There are nice discussions of writing, translation, and other aspects of the publishing business.
121 "Autobiography is unreliable. A lot of what we remember is designed to shield us from painful truths. As is a lot of what we forget, or choose to forget."
The book is full of such passages, that are nice to think about, though they don't always fit seamlessly into the story.
This book was definitely entertaining for at least the first half. After that, it got rather repetitive. The flamboyant publisher/boss keeps on, but the author's [or protagonist's] understanding of him does not seem to evolve much after that.
More intriguing to me would have been if the author had explored much deeper why she continued to be so drawn to his outrageous personality and behavior. Twenty years, for goodness sake! But probably she can't explain herself to herself [and most of us can't]. Charisma [if this is the right word for what this man had] is probably a slippery thing to get a handle on.
But the first half really is nice to read. I was glad for her snippets about her childhood; there could have been more of that, for my taste.
MICHAEL GLENNY WAS THE FINEST TRANSLATOR OF RUSSIAN LITERATURE, p 77
There are nice discussions of writing, translation, and other aspects of the publishing business.
121 "Autobiography is unreliable. A lot of what we remember is designed to shield us from painful truths. As is a lot of what we forget, or choose to forget."
The book is full of such passages, that are nice to think about, though they don't always fit seamlessly into the story.
April 7, 2012
The author worked for years at Quartet Books, gradually and somewhat unwillingly becoming the default ghost writer for its flamboyant (possibly gay?), Middle Eastern editor whom she calls Tiger. First she helps research and organize his interviews with prominent people, then somehow becomes the writer behind his novels. While a generous and mostly pleasant man, Tiger is also demanding, fastidious, and irrational, and soon Erdal needs to leave.
She’s written what is a very pleasant memoir about it all, striking a fine balance between her personal life (early childhood, an unexpected divorce) and work with Tiger. She also crafts, in fine, philosophical prose, some excellent passages on the nature of writing, translating, love, and other Big Issues. It’s a very entertaining and well written book.
She’s written what is a very pleasant memoir about it all, striking a fine balance between her personal life (early childhood, an unexpected divorce) and work with Tiger. She also crafts, in fine, philosophical prose, some excellent passages on the nature of writing, translating, love, and other Big Issues. It’s a very entertaining and well written book.
July 4, 2007
A ghostwriter's memoir. Jennie Erdal went from translating Russian lit to ghostwriting two novels for her writer/publisher boss, Tiger. Tiger's concept of the writing process is a little vague - "We are thinking about a beautiful novel, very beautiful. And it will have a beautiful cover. We will make sure of that." And the details of story/character/everything in between are left to Erdal. (Sex is an exception though. Tiger's adamant about having poetic, distinguish sex scenes and asks Erdal every day, "Have we done the fucky-fucky yet?") Ghostwriting seems to only lead to bizarre situations, and with the mind-boggling, fantastic Tiger at the center of them all, this was a great read.
March 6, 2023
The author recounts her years “ghosting” for this relentless man nicknamed “Tiger”. She drove her point home so well, it being that he sucked her dry by being so utterly demanding, that simply reading her reflections felt like an exhausting drag. And then even some resentment on my part: it takes two to tango, right? Like reading one-sided gossip magazines with one hand in a big bag of chips, it was not entirely unpleasant, even outright hilarious at times but overall, rather unfulfilling.
December 27, 2010
Entertaining, though I have to admit I was disappointed when (after reading the book) I did a little internet research to learn who she was ghostwriting for and I'd not heard of him nor any of the books she wrote for him. Still, an interesting glimpse into the life of a ghostwriter and her outrageous boss.
February 7, 2021
A young Scottish woman gets a dream job working for a flamboyant publisher managing the press's Russian list. She manages to work a few days a week in London and then do the rest from her home in St. Andrews the rest of the week. When her academic husband suddenly informs her that he is leaving her, she realizes that she can no longer continue to care for her young children and commute. The publisher offers her another kind of job that can be done from Scotland: helping him with his writing (by in fact doing all his writing). This leads to larger and larger writing projects as he begins publishing her books and then novels under his own name, and the ball rolls on from there. As an editor myself, I well know that behind-the-scenes book scaffolding can in some cases be far more extensive than you might assume. Ghosting feels like just another step along the process. In fact, ghostwriting does not need to be creepy; it is labor for hire just like any other job, but if it is kept in the shadows, as in Erdal's case, it can get super weird. And for Erdal, it really does. Erdal becomes enmeshed in her employer's demands that she jump into his crazy-town orbit: he rings her many times a day on a special phone, he is overbearing, anxious, and micromanaging. Although he can also be generous and the life of the party, at the end of the day he sounds like the quintessential nightmare boss (the narrative cloaks him in a thin veil, referring to him "Tiger," but Erdal cites him by name in her sources section at the back of the book). Unfortunately for everyone, Tiger is by far the most interesting character in the book, and his scenes are the most lively. For me, half of this book was fascinating and the other half annoying. The novels Erdal wrote for Tiger sound dreadful, and her inclusion of sex scenes from both books was tedious. However, she well tracks the emotional/practical series of choices that led her to a strange relationship with her employer that became weird passive martyrdom on her end.
June 7, 2021
Other reviews here summarize the book really well. For me, though, this book was beyond interesting, it was addictive. I am sorry the story is over. What a boss! I have no idea how she stuck with such a personality for fifteen years. The author had a very close relationship one on one with her publisher employer, and it was all a secret what she did for him.
After reading the book, I had to find out more about WHO the publisher actually was (find out on Wikipedia), and also, what was Jennie Erdal up to now? Unfortunately, I was a bit late. Both people have recently passed away.
This book was published in 2004, and I never would have found it except for a nearby yard sale. I was so glad I picked it up. I am a writer, and I also enjoyed her description of her writing process. And her fine vocabulary was so descriptive that she made me want to know more and more about what happened to their long partnership. And, this lady had a very difficult childhood that would have been a challenge to bust out of, which she did, obviously.
After reading the book, I had to find out more about WHO the publisher actually was (find out on Wikipedia), and also, what was Jennie Erdal up to now? Unfortunately, I was a bit late. Both people have recently passed away.
This book was published in 2004, and I never would have found it except for a nearby yard sale. I was so glad I picked it up. I am a writer, and I also enjoyed her description of her writing process. And her fine vocabulary was so descriptive that she made me want to know more and more about what happened to their long partnership. And, this lady had a very difficult childhood that would have been a challenge to bust out of, which she did, obviously.
January 20, 2020
The title indicates this book is about ghostwriting. It is, in its own way. But I would characterize it rather as memoir and creative nonfiction. Erdal provides some finely tuned sentences (and here-and-there even paragraphs), perhaps the best only tangentially related to the ghostwriting chores she performed for her exotic, neurotic, and prurient boss “Tiger” (Naim Attallah, b. 1931). Several times thinking both about Erdal’s job, with its “whiff of whoredom,” and about her writing of this book itself, I was reminded of the joking sententia, “If it’s not worth doing, it’s not worth doing well.”
April 28, 2020
I read this book for the first time in 2006. I loved it, I was inspired by it. Jennie is not only a writer, but also a translator. She loves language as I do. I was very excited to read this book again. I enjoyed the first part and all the references regarding languages, writing, translating. Then, near the end it was not as magical for me as it had been fourteen years ago. I guess I am not the same person. This is the story of the author who starts working for Tiger and becomes her ghost writer.
January 14, 2020
I enjoyed this account of a truly bizarre partnership.
The insights into the publishing world were interesting as well.
The author jumps quickly from incident to incident moving between
memoir and biography. I rather liked this pacing as it suited the
larger than life subject. I would enjoy reading another memoir by Ms. Erdal.
The insights into the publishing world were interesting as well.
The author jumps quickly from incident to incident moving between
memoir and biography. I rather liked this pacing as it suited the
larger than life subject. I would enjoy reading another memoir by Ms. Erdal.
October 12, 2020
Wow! Got so caught up in this incredible yet true story! I wanted to know this man, then I grew to hate him, then I realised he was just another terrifying narcissist, albeit a generous one, but Jennie was abused by him, enslaved by him and used by him for decades. He supported her and paid her but her life was put on hold to satisfy his arrogant whims. I hope she has recovered?
October 30, 2025
The ghostwriting relationship was intriguing, and she can obviously write well. Lots of great lines and observations. I enjoy stories where reality is as strange as fiction.
If she (and her boss "Tiger") hadn't been so committed to including explicit scenes in their novels, and quoted in this one, I may have given it 4 stars and recommended it more.
If she (and her boss "Tiger") hadn't been so committed to including explicit scenes in their novels, and quoted in this one, I may have given it 4 stars and recommended it more.
September 21, 2019
Interesting, really loved the beginning but began to tire in the last hundred pages. Odd to think about ghost writers operating behind the scenes. Tempted to read an actual novel by this writer, based on this memoir.
April 7, 2021
The life of a ghostwriter, or someone whose life is taken over by rich megalomaniac. While there were parts of the book I enjoyed, I didn't connect to it on a whole. Other than needing money, why couldn't she just say no?
August 1, 2018
Interesting, but I found it a bit hard going, and unable to put my finger on why.
June 30, 2019
Jennie Erdal is a surprisingly good writer, and although its subject wouldn't have normally attracted me, I found it an engrossing book.
January 1, 2020
poetic. lol inside joke with author lol. but honestly when i started it i wasn't sure i would care about the subject matter but it was ENTHRALLING. thank you, jennie, for this story.
February 9, 2020
Fascinating insight into a very strange man and into the psychology behind ghost writing.
February 7, 2021
Treacherous but sharp, witty, brilliant ...
March 19, 2025
Erg fijn, ze schrijft echt mooi.
December 28, 2008
i picked this up due to my interest in the lives og ghost writers. the author of this memoir wound up working as a ghost writer for a single employer, a man she called tiger, for about twenty years. she was originally hired by tiger to work as a translater. she had studied russian literature & language in college & tiger ran a publishing company that had acquired the rights to a russian manuscript & needed it translated into english. he was so appriciative of erdal's work that he started giving her more translating jobs, which led to a timely score when she got to read the original russian language manuscript of a book that went on to be a publishing coup in the early 80s (can't remember the name of the book--sorry). tiger began to heap more & more responsibilities upon erdal, & she accepted them because she enjoyed the weird, creative, glamorous work, & receiving tiger's largesse (such as money to save her house when her husband unexpectedly walked out on her & their children), & the flexible hours that permitted her to work from home in scotland. tiger is portrayed as quite the dandy, flinging money around & lucking into publishing integrity more than anything else. eventually he decides he wants to write a book too, but he can't write, so he dictates the skeleton of the story to erdal & asks her to write it. it sounds pretty dreadful, with tiger obviously imagining himself as the dashing protaganist who is irresistible to women. but she writes it, & due in part to tiger's publishing contacts, it's surpirisngly well-received. he has erdal editing an endless series of interviews he is conducting with well-known women, ghosting a weekly newspaper column, & writing a second novel, even more preposterous & dreadful than the first. she answers his correspondence, accompanies him to his country home just to keep him company, & is trying to hold down the fort of the sinking publishing company when tiger's spending outstrips the income & a shady character starts stringing tiger along, promising money & not following through. eventually her professional relationship with tiger ends on good terms, & erdal returns to a normal life with her new husband, & her own creative pursuits. this wasn't the best book i'd ever read, but tiger was a wacky enough character to keep things interesting. & the lengths he went to with the ghost writing kind of blew my mind. erdal was taking on an incredible degree of work & tiger seemed to have no idea what he was asking of her. it made me feel pretty lazy.
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