What Lies Around Us is quite an intriguing and shocking tale.

A British ghostwriter, Andrew, is offered a million dollars to write the autobiography of one of Hollywood’s biggest stars. The one offering the million dollars though is a powerful billionaire, with seemingly no real incentive to want this book written. Why is he so keen for it to be a success?

When Andrew is flown out to America to interview for the book, he gets more than he bargained for and the story cranks up a notch when he’s caught up in a school shooting. He finds himself becoming closer to his subject, that is until his wife, Caroline (who works in publishing), is flown out to work alongside him on the project.

This books starts out as a seemingly simple story of a ghostwriter’s stroke of luck, hitting the jackpot with a million dollar offer too good to refuse, especially as the subject is one of his celebrity crushes. It soon turns darker though as secrets are revealed and Andrew realises there is far more to this story than meets the eye.

Many thanks to Anna @ RedDoor for my review copy.

Via AmazonUK…..

It is possible that since this book’s publication you will have heard that I have died in “suspicious circumstances”. Obviously I hope that will not be the case, but I believe it is worth taking the risk in order to get this story out there.

Why would one of Silicon Valley’s most powerful billionaires offer a British ghostwriter a million dollars to write the autobiography of Hollywood’s biggest star?

Only once he is living and working among the world’s richest and most beautiful people does the ghost realise that there is way more than a publishing deal at stake.

The ghostwriter must face the dark underbelly of the tech industry. He must face corruption and manipulation, come to blows with people who will do anything to remain at the top of their game and uncover the dark truth behind what it really means to be an ‘influencer’ . . .

What Lies Around Us takes the reader into a world of myth-makers and power-brokers and reveals who is really running the world. Who is telling the stories and controlling the way we all think with a mixture of old media, social media and fake media?

About the author…..

Andrew Crofts is a ghostwriter and author who has published more than eighty books, a dozen of which were Sunday Times number one bestsellers. He has also guided a number of international clients successfully through the minefield of independent publishing.

Andrew’s name first became known amongst publishers for the stories he brought them by the otherwise disenfranchised. Travelling all over the world he worked with victims of enforced marriages in North Africa and the Middle East, sex workers in the Far East, orphans in war-torn areas like Croatia and dictatorships like Romania, victims of crimes and abused children everywhere. He also worked with members of the criminal fraternity.

The enormous success of these books brought many very different people to his door; first came the celebrities from the worlds of film, music, television and sport, and then the real elite in the form of world leaders and the mysterious, powerful people who finance them, arm them and, in some cases, control them.

As well as using traditional publishers to reach readers he has also experimented with e-books, publishing, “Secrets of the Italian Gardener”, a novella which draws on his experience amongst the powerful and wealthy, and “The Fabulous Dreams of Maggie de Beer”,(a prequel to his traditionally published “The Overnight Fame of Steffi McBride”, now filmed and appearing in episodes on YouTube’s This is Drama channel).

His books on writing include “Ghostwriting”, (A&C Black) and “The Freelance Writer’s Handbook”, (Piatkus), which has been reprinted eight times over twenty years.

Throughout his bestseller, “The Ghost”, Robert Harris quotes Andrew’s seminal book, “Ghostwriting”. Harris’s book went on to become a major movie by the same name, directed by Roman Polanski and starring Ewan McGregor as the eponymous ghost. The opening lines in Robert Harris’s book sum up Andrew’s philosophy:

“Of all the advantages ghosting offers, one of the greatest must be the opportunity that you get to meet people of interest”.