Correction.

I’ve just found something out that makes much of what I said in my post about Stars Wars incorrect. Apparently (and I feel foolish for thinking otherwise, really), the book wasn’t written by George Lucas at all, but was instead ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster. So my musings about Lucas being so fueled and excited about Star Wars and being a surprisingly good writer are now moot and a little silly. But I am a bit more eager to read “Splinter of the Mind’s Eye” than I was before, which, yes, I know is terrible.

I always feel so strange when I discover that something has been ghostwritten. It’s a strange thing to get upset about, but I almost feel lied to, in a way. Perhaps, because I am a writer, I want to take pride in my work and can’t imagine wearing a mask of something else, or perhaps, because I am a writer, I feel other writers should be honest with me and, when they’re not, it’s like a sort of writer betrayal. I have no idea if that makes sense, but I even remember being saddened when I found out that the Kenyon Moor who wrote two of the three King’s Quest novels was an alias for another author, and that, technically, Kenyon Moor wasn’t a real person. I can understand why an author would work under a different name; there are oodles of reasons. But it still makes this idealist a little sad.

Now, watch. Ten years from now, I’ll go and publish something under a fake name. In my defense, though, a lot can happen in ten years.