AI Policy: Where AI Touches Your Book, and Where It Never Does

A person sits with your father, and a person writes every sentence of his book. AI does three chores away from the words, and you can say no to all three. Below: where the line sits, stage by stage.

Begin the conversation

Written by Saurabh Garg, ghostwriter and biographer. One book at a time, every word his own. Updated 17 October 2026.

Will a machine write my father’s book? No. This page shows where AI sits in the work, stage by stage, so you never have to take my word for it.

Who does what, stage by stage

Every stage of a book, from the sample page to the printer. Ten of them. AI appears in three.

Ask for no AI and the three middle rows become “me” as well.

What AI does

Transcription

Every session is recorded. Over a full book that is 30 to 60 hours of tape, and a transcription tool turns it into text. Transcripts get words wrong, and in Punjabi they get a lot wrong. So anything quoted in the book gets checked against the audio, by me.

Sorting and timelines

AI tags the transcripts by person, place and year, builds a first timeline, and finds the session where your mother first mentioned the house in Ambala. It saves me days of searching. It decides nothing. Which stories go in, and in what order, is my call first and yours after, in the chapter plan you approve.

Typesetting and print files

Once the manuscript is final, software helps lay out the pages and build the files the printer needs. The words are locked by then. Nothing in this step changes a word.

What AI never does

1/ Write a sentence. Not a first draft, not a chapter, not a caption.
2/ Rewrite, edit or proofread one. A person does all three.
3/ Write your sample page. I write it by hand, from your recording.
4/ Plan or run an interview. I write the questions and I ask them.
5/ Research or fact-check. Dates, names and places are checked by a person, against documents and the people who were there.
6/ Invent anything. No made-up quote, scene or detail, ever.

Your recordings

Your voice on tape is the most personal thing you give me. By default, transcription and sorting run in tools set so your recordings and transcripts never train an AI model. If you want no AI anywhere in your book, say so. Transcription, sorting and typesetting then happen by hand. It takes longer.

How I handle everything else you send me, from your enquiry onwards, is in the privacy policy. Confidentiality for the book itself is on confidential ghostwriting.

What your contract says

Your contract names each AI use: transcription, sorting and timelines, typesetting. Strike any line before you sign. Anything the contract does not name, I do not do. If I ever want to add a use halfway through a book, I ask you in writing first, and no is a fine answer. The clause is number 10 in my ghostwriting agreement template.

Books written by my team

Books from about ₹5 lakh are written by biographers I train, with the same method, the same questions and the same chapter plan as my own books. The post on the ₹5 lakh book explains why that tier exists. The AI rules are the same too. AI transcribes, sorts and builds first timelines, and typesets at the end. The biographer writes every sentence. The contract names each use, and you can strike any of them.

Five questions to ask any writer about AI

Ask these of me, and of anyone else you are considering.

1/ Which stages use AI? Get the list in writing, stage by stage.
2/ Does any draft start as AI text? Ask how the sample page was written.
3/ Where do my recordings go, and can that tool train on them?
4/ Who checks the quotes in the book against the audio?
5/ Can I say no to AI and keep the same writer?

A writer who goes vague on any of these has answered it.

Why the line sits here

AI is good at the chores and bad at the job. It can transcribe fifteen hours of tape in an hour. It cannot sit across from a man of eighty and wait through the silence before he says the thing he never told his sons. That wait is the book.

Others in the trade draw a similar line. Gotham Ghostwriters, the New York agency, published AI guidelines in April 2026: AI for research and preparation, never for work that carries the client’s name. My line is tighter. AI does not research here either, because a wrong date in your father’s book is my mistake, and I would rather make it myself than inherit it.

So the machine gets the tape. I keep the room.

Questions about AI

Do you use ChatGPT or any AI to write the book?

No. A person writes every sentence of every book, in every draft. AI transcribes the recordings, sorts them into stories and timelines, and helps typeset the finished book. It never writes, edits or proofreads.

Is the sample page written with AI?

No. I write the sample page by hand, from your five-minute recording.

Can I ask for no AI at all?

Yes. Say so before you sign and the contract leaves every AI use out. Transcription, sorting and typesetting then happen by hand. It takes longer.

Will my recordings be used to train an AI model?

No. Recordings and transcripts only go into tools set so client data never trains a model, and if you choose no AI, they go into none at all.

Does AI check facts or do research for the book?

No. A person checks every date, name and place against documents and against the people who were there.

Do the ₹5 lakh team books follow the same rules?

Yes. The biographer writes every sentence. AI transcribes, sorts and builds first timelines, and helps typeset. The contract names each use, and you can strike any of them.

What if this policy changes?

The date at the top of this page changes with it. A change never applies to a signed contract unless you agree to it in writing.