I think she's been writing this book all her life, Dave!

Good point about the editing process, though. You've been there, so you know how it works.

But no doubt the book will be a best-seller.

I guess the assumption that she wrote it is the main thing. Doesn't this sort of thing happen frequently - "assisted by" meaning ghost written meaning written by someone else?
It would take someone with major skills and talent to eke out 400 pages about Sarah Palin. I'm far more interesting and would only rate 200 pages, at best. ;)

I don't think she really wrote it did she? It was ghosted no doubt. The problem is, when publishers pay celebs millions of dollares for their stupid memoirs, there's nothing left for us midlist writers.

R

just in time for Christmas..yippee. Now all the mavericks can put it at the top of their wish list and help grow her coffers.

Dave,
You’re a great asset to the OS community. Thanks for all that you post and continued good luck with “Columbine.”

“I wonder if it will read like she pounded it out without thought.”

Unless it’s the work of a team of ghost writers that’s pretty much a given. I mean we’re talking about Sarah Palin, right?

To steal a phrase Paul Begala used describing President GWB, listening to Sarah Palin trying to construct a coherent sentence is like watching a drunk man trying to cross an icy road.

Rated and appreciated.

yeah, she probably had a ghost-writer, but it's speeding writing for them, too. and imagine having to interview her about all the stuff AND write it in that time.

i bet she contributed pages and pages of "prose"--maybe even most or all of the first draft of each chapter, and then shuttled them to a rewrite guy. sarah strikes me as the type who believes she can do anything, with or without training or preparation. write a book? how hard can that be?

i would also be shocked if we don't hear her voice in there, and who could duplicate that?

(OK, i know the answer to that one: tina fey. hahaha. but isn't she already occupied?)

It's not too diffiult to write a book where no word is longer than one syllable and where each page has a picture of the author on it in various poses. The firearm pics should be great.

This book will be published just in time for the whacky Right to buy for Christmas.

Come on Dave! Don't spoil the fun! I hope Sarah wrote every word with her own fishy fingers and I especially hope that her editors don't change one phrase! After all, what's Sarah Palin if not word salad?

(Patiently waiting for the OS Nut Brigade to latch onto this post)

I doubt if those who purchase Palin's book are particularly concerned with the quality of the writing, or the editing!

Is there a nut brigade? Oh, I can't wait.

Yeah, Travel, the book could provide a lot of comedy. I bet a whole lot of standups are delirious today.

(The morning after the Grammy's, Kathy Griffen posted a short msg on her facebook page. I think it was just, Thank you, Kanye. hahaha. Later, she clarified the obvious: she was thanking him for being such an ass, handing her great material.)

I like her.

The real question in my mind is: Can she read it... without moving her lips?

Yeah, she wrote this book like I wrote Columbine. Sheesh.

Heard on the radio that she was holed up in San Diego (no distractions there!) for a week or more with the ghosty really buckling down and doing the work. Sounds like the GW really put in some hours. SP was likely enjoying the ocean view.

Surprised no one went for the obvious joke: What's Sarah going to do after finishing her first book? Read another one.

There's no way a publisher is going to commit resources to a Palin stream of consciousness. [we've all seen this, yes? http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/07/palin-speech-edit-200907?currentPage=1]

That said, with all of her stipulations for a recent fund-raising dinner, one where it's assumed the top bidder actually _likes_ her - things like no tough questions were on the list - there's no way she'd let some ghost writer put words in her mouth.

Heard that her ghost writer is the editor of some religous mag.

400 pages ain't nothing if you're using 20 point fonts and including 200 pages of pix, 50 pages of Bible quotes, and another 50 pages describing that "rat" Levi Johnson.

Hell's Bells, how the heck does one become a ghost writer? (I mean other than actually dying yet continuing to blog.) I can quote scripture with the best/worst of them............calling Glen Beck.

And yes it was rushed to print

Has anyone published the specs? With the right font size and generous margins, just about anything can be padded to this length. I'm guessing that the ghosting started right around the time she came onto the national scene. Like an obituary.

I was tempted to do a comment in nut-brigade style, but, eh.

I once knew a writer, something of a hack I guess, who (this was a long time ago) rolled several sheets and carbon into his typewriter and produced first-draft material. Well, this was after much writing experience and, it being fantasy, he was making it up as he went along. Wait a minute - the latter could apply here...

(to finish the thought) "it was rushed to print" to get it in stores for Christmas.

Publishers have no trouble at all committing resources to promote books like this. With all the wing-nuts out there, they are guarenteed to make a profit. And, Dave, contrary to what you might think about her large advance detracting from what other writers might earn, it's overwhelmingly successful sales by books just like hers that underwrite advances for unproven new talent.

And I agree that it would be a hell of a lot more fun if she'd written the damned thing herself. I'm chuckling just thinking about it......

Chapter 1: I really CAN see Russia from my house

Chapter 2: Katie Couric is mean

Chapter 3: Why I should be America's point guard

Chapter 4: I'm the most mavericky person I know

Chapter 5: Now I can buy all the clothes I want and nobody can make me give them back!

...

No kidding. Rated

I imagine that there was a large team on this. Break the book into thematic chapters and have an author sit down with Palin to get a feel for what she wants said. At the end, one or two editors message the prose to maintain a consistent tone. I think it's doable, particularly if she signed the contract in late 2008. Would anybody be shocked if it turns out she (or Todd) was talking to publishers before the election?

The fun will begin when the press and blogging community gets a chance to fact-check it.I'm betting on more than one significant lie per chapter.

You guys are funny. Thanks.

Dave, contrary to what you might think about her large advance detracting from what other writers might earn, it's overwhelmingly successful sales by books just like hers that underwrite advances for unproven new talent.

Ginny, I think you must be responding to someone else. I don't believe I said that. I'm actually conflicted. There are two schools of thought on celeb books: 1) the make a lot of money and feed the system. Assumption there: the # of dollars out there to buy books is highly elastic, and they expand it. 2) There is a relatively finite amount of book-buying dollars out there, and a finite amount of shelf space, review space, attention space. These books suck up a tremendous amount of it, and squeeze out quality books.

I'm not at all certain where the truth lies. I'm guessing closer to #2: that there is some elasticity in the amount of dollars, but way less than the amount sucked up by these books. And the shelf/review/attention space is finite and key ways shrinking. It definitely squeezes books out there.

How much these things keep books interesting to the public is very hard to gauge. (Also hard to gauge: the impact of reading crappy books on the decision to read/buy more books. We know from Hollywood that hits tend to generate more hits. When the public has been happy with recent movies they've seen, they want to go back for more. After a slew of dogs, it beats the whole market down for awhile.)

That makes sense. Many people only have time for a book or two a year. If they buy a great one and are wowed by it, they will likely buy/read again sooner. If it's a vapid, empty account, even though they chose it, they will still be turned off on books.

Hmmmmmm. I am coming down closer to your original statement, though I had not said it.

Did you hear? Sarah has her sequel half finished. "Going Vogue." She joins the Madonna tour and offers inside reports of the breakdown of our morals.

I don't think she could read a 400 page book in four months. we'll never know, cause she'll never read a 400 page book in any time span.

matthew, i saw that post and decided not to respond.

i didn't notice the "rouge." it took me awhile to figure out what you meant, because i'm a terrible speller and can never get those diphthongs to work. (i had to look up diphthongs--is that an ironic spelling?)

i could have easily made the same mistake, but it's still funny as hell.

I believe she is capable of filling 400 pages... printed, in crayon and including many, many pictures.

I think she'll need a team of editors from Vienna working around the clock to make any sense of her musings.

Most of these memoirs of flash-in-the-pan celebrities are really boring and poorly ghost-written. Gotta get it out before folks forget her!

It must be nice to have a publisher write your memoir. I heard her first attempt was just a three page coloring book. rated.

She must have a ghost writer. Plus with a book that's guaranteed saleable they're going to put an editor full time on it. Your editor was probably working with a number of great writers during that 10 months. Plus with a book like yours there would be fact checking and challenging, and stylistic stuff they aren't going to be as concerned about with Palin. The more she fucks up, the more media her book gets. They just want to get it out while she's still hot.

Here's not the pro SP post, but a funny and link-filled one from the Haitian:

http://open.salon.com/blog/chantal_laurent/2009/09/30/momment_of_zen_palin_going_rouge

"We spent ten months just editing my book."

Yeah, but your book contains facts, research, and thoughts that connect logically from one point to another! SP only has to blab about herself, which as far as I can tell is her #1 favorite topic of all time, plus Alaska. (Also. Too.)

And given how much her fans love her looks, I'm betting on at least 50 pages of photos that chart her ascendancy from A to B.

"assisted by" {choke, laugh, giggle, sigh, groan, swear and about a thousand other things}

Yeah, Dave, sorry, I was responding to Mr. Blumenthal's comment about the advance money. And you are absolutely right! This is a really funny group of folks responding to your post. (I especially like the chapter title, "I'm the Most Mavricky Person I Know." Friggin' brilliant.)

It seems like a LOT of people really really hate this broad, but here's another way to look at it: Like Kathy Griffen! Palin is actually good for us liberals. She is more polarizing than Hilary EVER was. Most of the conservatives are terrified of her, and that's great, right?

And the folks that would buy her book surely won't buy mine (when I finish it----and will likely send me hate mail based on the title alone) nor any other reader/writer posting here that has a book in stores.

I say enjoy the show! She's getting more than her fifteen minutes of fame, I'll grant you that, but watching someone make a fool of themselves over and over again is kinda fun. I'll bet we're going to have a blast with the book!

I don't even want to think about it, Dave. That was my first thought, too...... how on earth? I spent a year editing my book, too..... and it was a collection of essays by different people. On the other hand, not much, literarily or otherwise, is expcted of Ms. Palin. People will buy it for the (perceived) juicy bits and won't read the rest of it. She will be a flash in the pan, we can only hope, and then, poof, gone.

I think the fact that she's going red is a clear sign that she's a communist. Where's the outrage?! ;)

heh heh. thats funny, you just mentioned sarah palin in the same breath as hemingway. heh heh.

maybe she will retire on the $7M and finally leave us all alone... PLEASE!?!?

JB complains that he's only a "midlist" writer.. haha I thought I just saw him blog about being at the scraping-the-bottom :p
JB-- heres my idea-- maybe you should be a ghostwriter!!

Good post, Dave!

I'm an editor for a small publisher. (nonfiction, esoteric technical subject, small readership).

Yes, a good editing job takes many months.

I'd bet my Chicago Manual of Style that Sarah P. doesn't have an editor, she has a babysitter, and editor, and a ghost writer. They follow her around. They interview her. Then they write everything down, build the book, and give it to her to review. By "work" it means she has to read the drafts and offer comments.

That babysitter, editor, and ghostwriter are working their asses off. They might get a credit at the beginning. Maybe at the end. No, I cannot believe that Sarah P. wrote a book at all. Someone did it for her.

With Sarah Palin as "author" and her target audience, really, what need would there be to edit? I doubt the readers would even notice.

I hear the last 200 hundred pages are blank, because "y'know, the thing was gonna end anyway, right?"

Yup, that's speed writing without a whole lot of thought, supposedly "written" by a woman who has never believed she had any cause to doubt the rightness of her view point.

I don't hold out great hope for the quality of the end product. Alas, there are Teabaggers out there who will be certain it's "Great Literature" and feed her ego even as they pad her bank account.

Sarah has apparently pal-ing around with ghost writers and unrepentant editors.

Good post. The problem with Palin is that it could be written with the skills of a 5 year old, unedited and it will still sell. What does that say about people? They just want the dirt or are fans and will find it 'brilliant' and 'revealing'. Pah.

To me, an off the top of her head tell all would be *awesome* in a Keruoac On the Road kind of way. I mean, maybe it wouldn't be coherent, but if you just surfed the words it would be delightfully in the moment Zen.

Republicans couldn't hand the skank the presidency, so a "author" was the consolation prize.

Didn't the book come out at #1?

Shoot me now, please.

I found the book to be a great value. The lines are thick and easy to stay within and comes with a big box of crayons to boot.

In the words of Truman Capote -- that isn't writing; it's typing.

Just because it's not really Sarah writing it doesn't mean it isn't her words and ideas. I mean, it's like breast implants, isn't it?

Not to mention subediting: Hemingway*

COFFEETABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR!!
The thing is, at the rate these people actually read the books they buy to impress others on their coffeetables, ...The book WILL BE THE COFFEETABLE!
They got this to press so fast, and there was no way to "Dumb Down" the prose to the LCD as it is already originating from the LCD type of "Real Modern Day Amercian Mind", that I bet the coffe stains from the ghoster are still on certain pages in the entire run of the first editions.
At the very least, with this rush to press and lack of editing, it will certainly be "a one of kind read". Maybe it will become the new third grade primer for states like Texas that dictate the textbook industry's library.