How to Write Non-Fiction: Co-writing a non-fiction book
Co-writing is a great way to write a book faster as well as share the load of marketing. You and your co-author will bring different areas of expertise, and having a writing partner may even make the writing process more fun.
I’ve co-written several non-fiction books, The Healthy Writer with Dr Euan Lawson, The Relaxed Author with Mark Leslie Lefebvre, and Co-Writing a Book with J. Thorn. I’ve also co-written a number of novels, and the process of working with someone else has been different every time.
What are the different ways of co-writing?
Your process will depend on the experience of the writers involved and the way you each prefer to work, but there are several main methods.
(a) Each author takes different sections or chapters and writes separately
This is how Euan and I worked for The Healthy Writer. Each of us owned our different chapters and retained our individual voices throughout.
(b) Each author writes in every chapter, retaining separate voices
For The Relaxed Author, Mark and I wrote our thoughts on each topic and marked them clearly in each chapter. This made the audiobook as collaborative as the book itself, as we each recorded our separate sections and then collated them together.
(c) A/B drafting and revision
While you plan the book together, one author then takes the lead in writing the first draft.
The other author edits the material, so there is one coherent voice present throughout. The reader cannot tell who wrote which section when it’s complete.
You can also combine these, taking different approaches per chapter as J. Thorn and I did for Co-Writing a Book.
How to find the right person to co-write with
Trust and communication are crucial, so it’s best to already have some kind of relationship with the person you intend to co-write with.
You will need to work together on planning and structuring the book, then writing it, and then on publication and book marketing.
These tasks go on for many years, and since copyright lasts from fifty to seventy years after the death of the author/s, depending on jurisdiction, you will be tied together for longer than a marriage.
Do not enter into a co-writing relationship lightly!
Co-writing also works best if you’re at a similar level of writing ability, so one person isn’t doing all the heavy lifting.
When Euan approached me with the idea for The Healthy Writer, I asked him to write a test chapter so I could see what his writing was like. As you’d expect from an educated doctor who writes for medical journals, it was well written, but also technical and overly professional.
We worked together to help Euan explore his more informal voice, which is more appropriate for a self-help book, and only then did we decide to work together.
“Even if you’re the one leading the project, it won’t be what you think it’s going to be when you begin. If you have control freak tendencies — and we all do — it will take a period of adjustment. Compromise is key when co-creating any kind of art.”
—J. Thorn & Joanna Penn, Co-Writing a Book
How to work together effectively
Before you write a single word, have a series of conversations with your potential co-author to decide exactly how you will work together and to talk through thorny issues before they derail the book.
(1) Agree on a contract
It’s critical to nail down responsibilities for writing, publishing, marketing, finances, and your time up front, as these are the things that may cause stress later.
Even if you’re great friends — and perhaps especially if you’re great friends! — you need to put everything in writing.
There are template contracts online or you can work with an intellectual property lawyer, but even if you just create a basic document listing all responsibilities, you need something to lay out the ground rules.
(2) Plan for success
What if you sell millions of copies and become household names? What if you get asked to speak at events or go on podcasts or TV or radio? Who has the responsibility for that? Whose bank account will the money go into, or are you starting a company in your joint names? When will each of you get paid? Who will own the email list or social media accounts for this book? Who pays for marketing?
(3) Plan for failure
What if you can’t agree on the book and end up dissolving the partnership — who gets the material already written? How will you unwind your finances? What if one of you feels the other isn’t pulling their weight? What if one of you dies? What happens to the intellectual property and the money from book sales?
If you talk about all these things upfront when no one is emotionally fraught, it will be easier to sort out any difficulties in the future.
The Self-Publishing Advice blog has a great article on author collaboration quoting attorney Helen Sedwick:
For every successful writing partnership, there are dozens of failed ones, despite the best of intentions… To improve the odds of a successful writing partnership, take the time to put the collaboration agreement in writing… If writers do a good job discussing issues at the start, they are less likely to have misunderstandings later.
(4) Agree on working schedules and timelines
How much time will you spend on the book each week, and how long will you need to work at that pace?
You could agree to commit to a certain number of hours per week, or a certain number of chapters, with the first draft due in four months’ time. What works for the people involved will differ, but you need to agree or you may find time slips away from you, or one person may feel like they are doing more of the work.
Emily Thompson and Kathleen Shannon, co-authors of Being Boss, scheduled blocks of time to write together even though they lived apart. As Emily discussed in an interview on The Creative Penn Podcast,
We would get on Zoom together and on Google Docs. We were face to face. So we’re basically writing in the same room with each other. We would open up a Google Doc because you can do live writing and live editing, and we would sit there quietly and write the thing, and then we would switch and read each other’s. Sometimes we would read our own out loud and workshop it together.
With The Healthy Writer, Euan and I agreed on specific checkpoints where we would go through what we had written. We used Google Docs for the draft chapters, up to the point of structuring the book, when we moved everything into Scrivener. Then each of us took ownership of the master file while we worked on it, before handing it back to the other. We went through these iterations several times.
Mark Leslie Lefebvre and I had an interesting discovery process for The Relaxed Author. We’d been friends for over a decade and worked together professionally in different contexts, but never co-written together before.
I’m always early with my material and Mark works best to deadline, so we found our preferred way of working differed more than we expected. Of course, we adapted quickly, and we could be honest and realistic about the process based on our years of trust and friendship.
Communication is critical
Make sure you have regular calls or email for status updates. You could even keep a writing diary, which I did with J. Thorn when we co-wrote together.
We worked in different time zones and, as introverts, we didn’t find speaking a necessity, so we just wrote to each other after every session.
It doesn’t matter how you do it — every writing partnership finds its own rhythm. But the most important thing is to agree on what you’re doing up front, adjust as you go, and keep communicating along the way.
The communication doesn’t stop after the book is written and published. Marketing is an ongoing process and you will both need to collaborate on that too. If one party takes control of publishing, you may have to pay the co-author for years into the future, even if sales are negligible.
In the collaboration article on the Self-Publishing Advice blog, J. Thorn, who has co-written many books with many authors, says,
Putting your ego aside is by far the most emotionally challenging aspect of collaboration… It is impossible to collaborate without getting your feelings hurt at some point. It is the nature of working with another person.
Don’t react immediately if you feel hurt or slighted. Often, taking a day or two to respond will give you time to feel the sting and then move logically beyond it… Compromise with your partner and continue to move the project forward.
Multi-author projects
Co-writing is most often done as a partnership, but sometimes, there may be separate chapters written by many different people. This is common in academia for textbooks and also for collections of essays on a topic.
With multi-author projects, one author needs to take control and act as project manager and central communication point, as well as editing the project for a consistent theme. This type of book can be a logistical challenge, so only take it on if you enjoy organisation and working with others. Once again, the contracts and communication should be clear.
Questions:
• Are you considering co-writing? Why would it be a good fit for your project?
• Have you identified a potential co-writing partner? Do you already have an existing relationship?
• What needs to go into your contract?
• How will you work together in a practical way? How will you communicate?
• How will you ensure your relationship is preserved in case of difficulty?
Resources:
• Co-Writing a Book: Collaboration and Co-creation for Authors — Joanna Penn and J. Thorn
• How to Co-Write a Book. Collaboration and Co-Creation with J. Thorn — www.TheCreativePenn.com/co-writing
• How to be a Healthy Writer with Dr Euan Lawson, which includes a section on how we co-wrote The Healthy Writer: www.TheCreativePenn.com/healthy-cowriting
• Creative Entrepreneurship and Being Boss with Emily Thompson: www.TheCreativePenn.com/beingboss
• Co-writing The Relaxed Author with Mark Leslie Lefebvre — www.TheCreativePenn.com/co-writing-relaxed
• The Ultimate Guide to Author Collaboration in Writing and Publishing, featuring Helen Sedwick, J. Thorn, and others — SelfPublishingAdvice.org/author-collaboration-writing-publishing/
