Marina Krakovsky – Ghostwriter

Hello! If you're an expert in your field, I'd love to help you share your expertise with the world.

I'm a journalist, author, and editorial consultant specializing in the social sciences.
• I'm the author of one business book, THE MIDDLEMAN ECONOMY, and have completed collaborations on four others: SECRETS OF THE MONEYLAB, DIE WITH ZERO, HOW GOOGLE WORKS, and TRILLION DOLLAR COACH. (I was the co-author on the first, the ghostwriter on the second, and the researcher on the remaining two.)
• My articles and essays have appeared in Discover, the New York Times Magazine, Scientific American and Scientific American Mind, O, The Oprah Magazine, Psychology Today, Slate, FastCompany, Stanford Magazine, the Washington Post, Wired, and more.
• I earned my degree in English from Stanford University, and for more than 10 years I wrote articles about faculty research for the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
• Before I turned to journalism and editorial consulting, I worked for 8 years as a software technical writer, first on staff and later as an independent contractor—creating user manuals for Oracle, Apple, and other software companies. During this time, I also wrote an after-market book, UNDERSTANDING THE ORACLE SERVER, published by Prentice-Hall.
• My experience in explanatory journalism serves my clients well: I ask probing questions to fully understand your ideas — so that I can ultimately explain these ideas to your audience in an engaging and accessible way. I also understand how acquiring editors think, helping you create pieces that editors will be inclined to accept with minimal revision.
• My editorial services include ghostwriting, developmental editing, finding relevant research and examples, creating and critiquing book proposals, suggesting appropriate agents, and guiding authors through the entire process from idea to publication.


• Whether you are looking for help with a book or an article, the writing itself can't start without some serious thinking and planning. What is your book or article trying to achieve? Who is the audience? What's the best way to approach the project, and what will a successful end product look like? These are some of the key questions you must answer before you begin writing—yet I find that most experts who come to me need help with thinking through these questions; even if they have editorial know-how, they are usually too close to the material to see the forest for the trees.

That's why my first offer is almost always for a consultation. For example, if you've submitted some written materials, I'll most likely suggest a consultation consisting of a review of the materials and a video call to discuss this feedback, answer questions, and suggest the next steps. Or, if you're looking for help with a book proposal to submit to agents and publishers, the consultation will help you tease out whether you truly have the makings of a salable proposal before you invest the time and money in developing the proposal. No matter what the project, starting with a consultation is an opportunity for both of us to test the waters before deciding whether we want to make a larger commitment to a full article, a book proposal, or an entire book.

• If you're looking for help with a book, know that a book is a huge undertaking. "No kidding," you say—"that's why I'm looking for a ghostwriter!" But even with a ghostwriter, a book is still a huge undertaking for you because it's impossible to outsource all the work—a successful client-ghostwriter relationship is truly a collaboration, requiring significant time and effort from both parties. Yes, working with me will save you time (and will yield higher quality) than doing everything yourself—but you are the expert in your subject and in what you like. So to attain the best possible product you need to carve out time for interviews, draft reviews, and the like.

The single biggest time commitment I ask for of book authors is a regular weekly call (about one hour); during that call, I ask questions to gather all the information I need to do that week's work on my end. Doing that not only enables me to work efficiently (which saves you money)—it also helps me capture your voice (in a way that sending me a bunch of documents does not).

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"Having well-thought-out ideas is one thing, but converting those ideas into a convincing, easy-to-read book is another. For that, I would need to work with a writer who could take my words, stories, and explanations and shape them into a flowing, easy-to-read text while retaining my voice, style, and passion. That writer was Marina. I was really lucky to have a writer who was familiar with the relevant ideas from economics and who had the ability to support these ideas with relevant academic research. She also knew my agent as well as Kay-Yut Chen, a brilliant economist whom I went on to hire for work on this book. I want to thank Marina not only for all this, but also for pushing me through the long, unfamiliar, and sometimes painful process of turning a complex series of ideas into a book anyone can understand." (From author Bill Perkins's Acknowledgements in DIE WITH ZERO, a book that went on to become a WSJ business-books bestseller)

"Marina, our research partner, always goes about two steps farther than we expect. She is as insightful and thoughtful as she is diligent and thorough." (From the Acknowledgements of the New York Times bestseller HOW GOOGLE WORKS, by Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg, and Alan Eagle)

"Marina helped us connect Bill's principles with academic research, showing that he was truly ahead of his time in the business management world. She is always creative and insightful, and a heck of an editor to boot. It was a great pleasure to work with you again, Marina!" (From the Acknowledgements of the NYT and WSJ bestseller TRILLION DOLLAR COACH, by Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg, and Alan Eagle)

"I have now worked with Marina on two books, and I give her my highest recommendation. In my first book, The Mystery of the Kibbutz, Marina was instrumental at the development stage. She encouraged me to tell my family story, which turned out to be the part of the book readers liked and remembered the most. The second book, Streets of Gold, was at a more advanced stage when Marina read every single word with the precision of a fine jeweler. Her amazing editing raised the manuscript to a new level. Marina is thorough, clear, thoughtful, and deep. She has a unique talent to detect everything that is weak and confusing in a book and to make simple, practical, and insightful suggestions that magically make the book so much better. I can’t thank Marina enough, and I recommend her in the highest possible terms.” (Ran Abramitzky, Professor of Economics at Stanford, author of THE MYSTERY OF THE KIBBUTZ and co-author with Leah Boustan of STREETS OF GOLD: America's Untold Story of Immigrant Success, forthcoming 2022)

What about short-form content and other services?

• In addition to working on books, I help experts in their fields produce shorter-form content—blog posts, articles, and ebooks.
• I provide proposal critiques for existing proposal drafts, and I develop detailed outlines and other proposal sections.
• Although Reedsy requires service providers to be listed as either ghostwriters or editors, not both, there's often a gray area between these services, particularly for experts who like to do some of their own writing, so I also provide developmental editing where appropriate.
• Reedsy doesn't offer a "Consultation" menu item for people hiring a ghostwriter, so if that's all you want, choose any service and mention consulting/questions in your description.
• For experts who prefer to do their own writing but need some coaching to help them move forward, I serve as a sounding board, accountability partner, and voice of encouragement.

What don't I do?

I don't have the special skills required to write fiction or memoir/autobiography, so I don't take on those projects. If you want help with your novel or your life story, you'll be far better off finding a writer who specializes in those areas.