Customer Reviews

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

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This text has seven chapters written by the various editors of the collection. The general claim of the book is self evident: do not send out a manuscript that is very close to your dissertation. Of the three books that I read about the topic of preparing a manuscript for publication, this book is the least useful. The chapters by Robert Plant Armstrong prove particularly annoying, condescending, and useless. For example, his first entry (Ch.2: The Dissertation's Deadly Sins) begins thusly: "The dissertation system must have laid at its door an enormous squandering of creativity, youth, time, and money each year upon the execution of prose works that do not communicate significantly and are therefore dysfunctional" (11). Neither of Armstrong's chapters will give you a hug. On the contrary, I wanted to punch his smug face.

This book gave me the impression that nothing would be worth bringing to a publisher. In fact, I would be embarrassed to submit even a query letter. Editors are gods, and I am a mortal sinner by earning a PhD. Having submitted and published short stories, I know rejection well enough--but also some success as well. Never in all the years of submitting stories did I feel discouraged to the point of giving up, but if I'd read The Thesis and the Book prior to entering a doctoral program, then I might have been ready to call it quits.

I understand the importance of revising one's work and allowing a span of time between writing and submitting, as I assume most graduate students, nevermind junior faculty, would recognize. So what is the payoff in reading The Thesis and the Book at any point? The benefit would be that other junior faculty will abandon their projects and, in turn, open up publishing opportunities for the rest of us. Otherwise, this book serves as a venting outlet for editors. The parallel would be me telling undergraduates in a composition class that each of them should drop the course now, and those that want to stay enrolled, I have no time for you. Only those that already have the skills should stay. Behind the claims of this book is an indictment of our mentors and committee members. They misdirected us. They misinformed us. They, perhaps worst of all, misrepresent us to the scholarly community in which we want to enter.

Call this book a test of faith, but you should avoid reading it. There are books that will be advantageous and encouraging for your project, but The Thesis and the Book is not that book.

I'm at the stage now in my career as a historian. Rather than simply send in the dissertation to a publisher, which I feared might be poorly viewed in academia and not be my best work for future reference, I set it aside for about six months. Then I talked to my committee and got their input. The result was contact to a former editor in my field who recommended three books: "The Thesis and the Book" was one of these. By and large these seven essays offer good advice and solid examples I think I can follow. Basically I have to rethink how I was thinking about my subject and write what I would have originally wanted to write had it not be so incumbent on me to prove every stage of my research. I read this book slowly, letting each essay set in my mind and taking notes. I wanted to internalize the processes these authors were suggesting to make the revisions flow more smoothly.

This book (which i did not finish to read) lists a number of flaws you should avoid when you try to convert a thesis into a fair readable book, and that is what I am trying to do.
But it is a little wordy and wooly, and a bit too theoretical.
However, it can be useful, in my opinion, chiefly for literary workshops.