Stranger Things actor Millie Bobby Brown’s debut novel, Nineteen Steps, revolves loosely around true events. In 1943, the Bethnal Green tube disaster claimed the lives of 173 Londoners, due to faulty stairs in the station used as an air raid shelter.
There’s been vocal backlash against the book – partly due to Brown’s outsourcing, but also for its quality. The novel’s first paragraph, which has been shared widely on social media, ends with the line: For example, anyone who’s devoured a Hardy Boys novel or an instalment of The Baby-Sitters Club owes hours of enjoyment to the invisible authors behind household names Franklin W. Dixon and Ann M. Martin. These serialised books for young readers revolve around familiar characters and the comforting rhythms of formulaic story arcs.
When working with a public figure or celebrity to tell their life story, the writer’s purpose is to help them excavate their circumstances, memories and perspectives – and to then shape them into a readable book. Their task doesn’t necessarily include representing the celebrity “author” or collaborator as a competent, imaginative writer.
As Noongar Australian author Claire G. Coleman recently tweeted about Brown’s Nineteen Steps: “This book will outsell books by real authors because her name is on it.” Ghost in the machine Pointing the finger at capitalism seems almost too easy. But ready-made audiences are seductive to publishers, who do business in a notoriously competitive domain. Ghostwritten celebrity novels may not always be a critical success, but they often succeed commercially – at least for a while.