A couple days ago I was looking through some recent paperback romance novels that I had bought and wondered about the ones credited to Janet Dailey, who passed away in 2013. (Image above taken from the Fantastic Fiction website.)
At first I thought about asking on Twitter if anyone knew whether the books were really written by her, or written by someone else using her name. But then I decided to Google that question instead -- figuring that the question must have been raised previously -- and one of the results of my search was this April 30, 2021 blog post by Lindsay Hobbs titled "Janet Dailey and the Curious Case of the Missing Author."
That article tackled the very questions I had about the situation, but on the other hand it seemed to have led to a dead end. Yes, someone else was writing the books, but no one was saying who.
Doing a little more digging, however, it looks like the name of the ghost writer is mentioned in the acknowledgements of most (not all) of the new Janet Dailey books.
The book that the blogger looked at, Calder Brand (2021), lacks an acknowledgement. I have the paperback edition of Hart's Hollow Farm (originally published in hardcover in Oct. 2019, the paperback is dated Feb. 2020) and I don't see an acknowledgement in that one either.
However, I also have the paperback edition of Texas Forever (hardcover came out Sept. 2019, paperback came out July 2020) and it says "With special thanks to Elizabeth Lane" at the beginning of the book.
I looked on the preview pages at Amazon for Janet Dailey's other books that came out after her death in 2013 to see if they showed a similar acknowledgement. Most of them thanked former Harlequin writer Elizabeth Lane at the beginning of the book. One of them, Paradise Peak (2020), thanked April Standard (who writes for Harlequin under the name April Arrington).
Some of the "Janet Dailey" books in 2014-2016 give the Copyright to Janet Dailey (not the estate) on the copyright page in the book, which made me wonder if they had been written before she died. But when I looked them up on the website of the U.S. Copyright Office, they were copyrighted by "The Estate of Janet Dailey" instead. Obviously a dead person can't own a copyright, so that was probably just a slip-up on the printed books.
The U.S. Copyright Office entry for Texas True (2014) lists the "Date of Creation" as 2013. This was the first book in "The Tylers of Texas" series. Since Janet Dailey died at the end of 2013 (December 14), and the book doesn't appear to thank someone else, then perhaps Dailey did write this book. If so (and that's still a big if) it's understandable why her estate (and her publisher, Zebra Books/Kensington) would then want this new series to continue, despite the death of its author. All of the subsequent books in the "Texas" series thank Elizabeth Lane at the beginning of the book.
The book that the blogger looked at, Calder Brand (2021), lacks an acknowledgement. I have the paperback edition of Hart's Hollow Farm (originally published in hardcover in Oct. 2019, the paperback is dated Feb. 2020) and I don't see an acknowledgement in that one either.
However, I also have the paperback edition of Texas Forever (hardcover came out Sept. 2019, paperback came out July 2020) and it says "With special thanks to Elizabeth Lane" at the beginning of the book.
I looked on the preview pages at Amazon for Janet Dailey's other books that came out after her death in 2013 to see if they showed a similar acknowledgement. Most of them thanked former Harlequin writer Elizabeth Lane at the beginning of the book. One of them, Paradise Peak (2020), thanked April Standard (who writes for Harlequin under the name April Arrington).
Some of the "Janet Dailey" books in 2014-2016 give the Copyright to Janet Dailey (not the estate) on the copyright page in the book, which made me wonder if they had been written before she died. But when I looked them up on the website of the U.S. Copyright Office, they were copyrighted by "The Estate of Janet Dailey" instead. Obviously a dead person can't own a copyright, so that was probably just a slip-up on the printed books.
The U.S. Copyright Office entry for Texas True (2014) lists the "Date of Creation" as 2013. This was the first book in "The Tylers of Texas" series. Since Janet Dailey died at the end of 2013 (December 14), and the book doesn't appear to thank someone else, then perhaps Dailey did write this book. If so (and that's still a big if) it's understandable why her estate (and her publisher, Zebra Books/Kensington) would then want this new series to continue, despite the death of its author. All of the subsequent books in the "Texas" series thank Elizabeth Lane at the beginning of the book.
In addition to the new novels that bear her name, "Janet Dailey" also has contributed shorter stories to two anthology books that were published after her death. The Happy is the Bride anthology (2017) contains a story by Janet Dailey titled "The Wedding Bet" that is copyrighted 2017 by Janet Dailey inside on the copyright page, but the U.S. Copyright Office lists "The Estate of Janet Dailey" as the Copyright Claimant. Also the 2018 anthology A Wedding on Bluebird Way contains a story by "Janet Dailey" titled "Bachelor Honeymoon," which is copyrighted 2018 by The Estate of Janet Dailey.
Using a screenshot I made from the Janet Dailey entry at the Fantastic Fiction website, I've added the names of the ghost writers to some of these newer books, based on that person being thanked in the acknowledgements inside the book. If it's blank, that means I either didn't have access to the book or the book didn't acknowledge/thank anyone inside. Maybe I'll update this page if/when more information becomes available.
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