The Ghost Writer

By Robert Harris,

Book cover of The Ghost Writer

Book description

'An unputdownable thriller about corrupt power and sex' Sunday Telegraph

'Guaranteed to keep you awake' The Times

A body washes up on the deserted coastline of America's most exclusive holiday retreat. But it's no open-and-shut case of suicide. The death of Robert McAra is just the first piece of the…

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Why read it?

2 authors picked The Ghost Writer as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

This one was a game-changer for me, taking thinly-disguised characters and events from real life – an obvious Tony Blair-type, fleeing prosecution for war crimes in a clear nod to the Iraq War – Harris wisely ushers us into the world of high-stakes politics via the innocent and unnamed Ghost Writer, hired to write a disgraced Prime Minister’s memoirs.

It’s a brilliant and clever mechanism that makes the reader feel at home. And when murder appears, puts you squarely in the shoes of a terrified man on the run.

As a technical piece of thriller writing, it’s stunning stuff. Harris’s…

All Robert Harris’s books are good, and many of them are huge bestsellers. This one is a particularly tightly written thriller. It accurately depicts the world of ghostwriters, and how their relationships with their famous clients work. It was later made into a movie by Roman Polanski, with Ewan McGregor as the ghostwriter and Pierce Brosnan as his ex-prime minister client, raising the profile of the ghostwriting business even further. I loved that he quoted my Ghostwriting book at the start of each chapter.

From Andrew's list on ghostwriting and ghostwriters.

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