The Thesis and the Book: A Guide for First-Time Academic Authors

by Siobhan McMenemy (Editor), Eleanor Harman (Editor), Ian Montagnes (Editor)

The academic caveat Publish or Perish is not a new one, and for over a quarter of a century, The Thesis and the Book has come to the aid of graduate students in their quest for publication. The doctoral dissertation, usually the first book-length study completed by a scholar, is, however, only rarely publishable as a book. Understanding the differences between the two forms is a crucial part of one's education as a scholar and is equally important in appreciating the endeavours of scholarly publishers. The Thesis and the A Guide for First-Time Academic Authors , revised and expanded in this second edition, will continue to provide the best overview of the process of revising a dissertation for publication. Drawing on the expertise of the contributors, all of whom are editors, publishers, and scholars themselves, the chapters present the rudimentary differences between a thesis and a book (including matters of purpose and audience), give guidance on the necessary stylistic, technical, and structural revisions to the dissertation, and offer advice to first-time authors who must not only revise their work to satisfy prospective publishers, but also learn a good deal of the ins and outs of scholarly publishing. The Thesis and the Book will continue to be of great value to graduating doctoral students seeking publication and to the faculty members who supervise these students. It will also be of value to acquisitions editors at scholarly presses, who must contend with the submission of revised dissertations for publication.

Genres: Writing, Academia, Nonfiction

176 pages, Paperback

First published May 31, 2003

Reviews

[Syntaxx · Rating 2 out of 5]

Short succinct, and yet still somehow incredibly wordy. I did learn a new word: pusillanimous. The thesis is a candidate demonstrating their ability to carry out research. The audience is primarily their committee.

When transitioning a thesis to a book for the mainstream, short and to the point should be the aim.

Redundancy is of two kinds: structural, functional and informational. It is not necessary to cite the obvious. The triviality of a thesis is irremediable.

Revision is not a quick rerun, added here or deleted there, a bit of finishing up. a revision is a process and it is arduous.

I found chapter 6, the academic authors checklist, to be the most useful part of the book.

[Susan Y, · Rating 5 out of 5]

I recommended this little book to our authors and to thesis authors who needed to turn a thesis into a book. Composed of essays drawn from SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING, the advice in this little book is a great help to the author of scholarly monographs and books.

[Blair_metal · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was recommended by my professor/research director following the approval of my Masters thesis. I really only found one or two chapters useful. This book comes across as more of a general overview of the differences between theses and published books than a practical "guide for first-time academic authors". To be fair, it must be hard putting together a collection of essays that will convey information that will ring relevant and useful to all academic writers, since the decisions/steps leading to thesis publication must vary considerably from one person's work to another (subject, length, experience, writing style, publisher, etc). The authors in this collection certainly did not downplay the amount of potential work the publication of an academic manuscript requires (I appreciate the honesty); however, the tones of most of the essays are not very encouraging and somewhat alienating.

[Jessica Zu · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pretty useful book for those who seek general information on how to transform a thesis into a book. But there is no hands on instructions. I guess it's because every discipline is different and every publisher is different. One of my professors told me that it took her a year of serious work (30 per week) to finish make her thesis into a book (which is a top quality one). But another professor of mine only spent about a month (among teaching 4 courses and preparing a handful of conference papers) to transform part of her thesis into a book (I'm not sure about her book but her thesis really looks like it need more editing and more work). So I guess it all depends on how good you wanna your book to be. More work will always turn out better books. Information itself are important but the way you present the information is much more important in a book.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

As with any edited collections, some chapters were better than others. Overall, the first and fifth chapters did a nice job pointing toward some key and common differences between dissertations and books. And I found the checklists in the sixth chapter immensely helpful and really think they should and could be used to test the strength of any piece of academic writing. I'd highly recommend those chapters in particular. The rest of the volume might be skipped if you've already read other sorts of thesis/book advice books as it is more geared toward readying a manuscript for sending to publishers, etc.

[meeners · Rating 4 out of 5]

found this one more useful than from dissertation to book - the essay format is perhaps best suited to this particular topic, i think. most helpful essays for me were "avoiding the warmed-over dissertation" (best piece of advice: unlike with a dissertation, one should try writing the intro first); "thesis to book" (again: revise, revise, revise...but author gives effective, concrete examples); and the checklist at the back.

note: make sure you're reading the revised 2nd edition, not the 1st edition (which was published in 1976!). even with the 2nd edition, though, a lot of the practical publishing advice is outdated.

[Mary Shelton · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's actually very useful, but the language has sort of a formal, old fashioned style. As it turns out, this is the second edition of a book published in 1976. What had to be updated has been updated, and the fact that the timeless information is in its original wording makes it more interesting. But I'm going to stop trying so hard to get cheaper, earlier editions of everything.

[Zane Yi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Last three chapters are especially helpful, offering practical insights into academic writing and publishing.

[Aaron Dalton · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://perlkonig.com/2012/05/22/thesi...