More On "Nailing the Interviews: Excerpt from my book, "A Friendly Guide to Writing and Ghostwriting."

It’s an intimate experience to sit down in a quiet room, face someone whom you hardly know and begin an in-depth interview. During this process, I tape the conversations. I turn on my recorder, I look directly into the eyes of the person opposite me, I ask questions, and I do my best to interpret smiles, frowns or darting looks. Maintaining eye contact is crucial for making a strong connection so if I’m looking downward to take written notes, it will cause me to lose focus, miss some important signs and risk breaking the delicate bond we’re forging.

I’ve gotten pretty good at reading my clients during interviews, but still, I make mistakes. When the process reaches a point where they come up against an event in their history that was not pleasant and no one jumps in to save them, tension rises and they may start to act out. I try to see them like a child throwing a tantrum and I become a comforter and a de-escalator, encouraging them to stop and breathe. They have to see me as an ally, not an enemy, while I urge them to dig into the secrets they have so handily tucked away. At the same time, I have to show them that as kind, gentle, and compassionate as I am, I’m not about to back down. They have to believe that I’m strong enough to keep their secrets. (Ah, the book I could write if there was no confidentiality.) I do my best to put them at ease but when I ask a question and I get a negative reaction, I apologize and hope I haven't broken the tenuous connection we’ve established.

I once asked a woman about her parent’s divorce and she got an instant migraine. I hadn't tried to upset her, but I apologized anyway. Even if you do or say nothing wrong, if you find it difficult to apologize, you have to learn to do it. A simple gesture to show that you might have been at fault is easy and it works wonders. As powerful and charismatic as celebrities may seem, their egos are fragile. They've gotten really good at hiding it, but don’t be fooled by their outer semblance of self-confidence or control. They are human beings just like us. They cry, they bleed, they fall in love, they get dumped, and they get their feelings hurt so an apology can go a long way.

It isn't easy to be the leader, the alpha dog, with someone who doesn’t like to be a follower. But you need to show them in no uncertain terms that you’re solid, you are always there, you are kind and focused, and no matter what they do or don't do, the book will be written. Early one morning, while I was getting ready to drive to the home of a client who had a notorious alcohol problem, she called me on the phone and slurred, “I’m ripped to the tits. I’ve been up for three days. You can come over but we're not gonna get any work done.”

I hung up the phone and after a moment of contemplation, I decided to go to her house anyway, partly because I wanted to see her loaded. Her drunken bouts were legendary. Mostly, though, I wanted her to feel my consistency. I wanted her to know that our schedule would remain the same and the book would get finished, no matter what brand of craziness she pulled.

When I arrived at her house and knocked on the door, she opened it with a can of beer in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. I stayed with her for the three hours we usually worked, it was pretty entertaining, and I left when the time was up. We didn't get any work done that day, she had been right about that, but I had demonstrated that I was consistent and would remain so. I would meet the deadline with or without her. Gratefully, that behavior was never repeated and the day after we finished writing, her friends did an intervention with her and she went into rehab.

Collaborating takes guts, inner strength, and a sense that you know what’s best in order to move beyond diversions and excavate someone else’s life. Even when it’s going smoothly, it takes stamina and courage to face the challenges that make up any artistic endeavor. It also takes a willingness to become someone else which is as hard as it sounds.

When I interviewed a client, Jami Goldman, about losing her legs to frostbite, I was falling asleep that night and suddenly I thought my legs were gone. I sat up abruptly and I reached downward to touch my calves and my feet. They were still there. I breathed a sigh of relief. I was clearly getting too personally involved, but I loved Jami, I saw her as a hero, and I was happy to do what it took to tell her amazing story. With that in mind, if a person seems repulsive or impossible to work with, I have to decline the project. Who wants to jump into the skin of someone you don't respect or like?

Interviewing friends and family is a great source of inside information that the subject may have forgotten. It helps you fill in the blanks. Sometimes they are the only source of information. I was hired to write the life story of a guru who had risen to power at the age of eight when his father died. Then, in his forties, he traveled the world, he had hundreds of thousands of followers, and I was looking forward to meeting with him. But it never happened. Maybe he felt that if he did personal interviews, he would be taken to task by his detractors, of which he had many. If he refrained, he could say he had nothing to do with the information. This is what I decided was the reason, but right or wrong, I had to get the information.

I conducted interviews with his close friends, a few of his family members and even his chef. In the end, I got most of my information from a loyal follower who had been with him since he was a child. This man lived in Denmark and although we never met in person, I interviewed him on Skype several times a week. When the book was finished, the guru gave it a silent okay but he didn’t put his name on the book. At his request, I was listed as the sole author.

That was the exception. I always look forward to the interviews. In general, I’ve found that taping anyone for more than two hours can be challenging but there are times when I have no choice. If a client is here from out of town or if I’ve traveled to see them, I may have only a few days to get the bulk of the material. That means I have to interview them all day and it’s pretty exhausting. When conditions allow it, I like to see my client about once a week for a couple of hours so I can stop the interview when I see that they’re getting weary.

It becomes hard when a client starts to dig into the cache of secrets they’ve hidden away. If and when they feel too exposed, there are various ways they push up against me. One of my clients got extremely mean toward the end of the book and tried to get me to quit. Someone else had an unwanted pregnancy when there was one month left to get to the finish line. Someone threatened to leave the country. Yet another began to take copious amounts of opiates and she disappeared for days.

I don't understand why they do this. Perhaps the end of the book signals their fear of being judged when they start promoting it. It triggers their vulnerability because they often have to endure shaming and scathing reviews as they travel from city to city, showing up at badly managed book signings and getting trapped by adoring fans who want to get close to them. These days, they have to endure social media outbursts that can be punishing and pretty unbearable.

To counteract some of that, you will need to keep things light, laugh a lot, choose your questions wisely, be steady, and show your client that you’re not judging her. Show her that you know what you're doing, even if you don’t. It’s like walking through someone else’s world with confidence even though you're wearing blinders. You have to plot out a path, feel your way, and muster all the courage you can find. The strength and flexibility you gain from nailing the interviews will allow you to move on to the next phase with confidence and trust that you are up to the task.