Model Planes

As a child I loved building model planes, cars, and a lot of other things that usually flew.

One Christmas I was given a model helicopter to build. I got too excited and put the two main pieces together first.

The instructions outline how to start building elements that would not be seen. They’re inside and fundamental to how the propeller would be held, aspects of the motor, other pieces that need to be put in place to hold something else later.

Writing seems straight forward. One word, then another to finish a sentence. Repeat while building on ideas. We’ve been writing since we were children. It’s just much more words for a book.

But when you rush into it too fast you will fail to put all the pieces together. Maybe you’ve got the two large parts that people will see, but what holds those together will be missing. If you approach it this way you will quickly be exhausted, confused, disillusioned with writing, and have lost sight of the overall book. You’ll run out of energy to be able to see it through.

For my ghostwriting work I spend more time than my clients probably expect working through the outline of the book, the motives for writing, understanding how different parts will come together. When that work is in place then we can put the other parts that are more visible. It’s essential to do this work of the details that the reader will never see. It’s the fundamental work that holds it together in the chassis.