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Writing a Technical Book for Manning

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Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#21

Post by detaro »

stephenbez wrote: post #19
4thaccount wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have lots of programming books (30-40) from half a dozen publishers and Manning is one of my favorite along with NoStarch Press. O'Reilly is probably third, but they don't make books anymore. Packt is alright, but you often don't get the same thing as a Manning book. They're more like a way for someone to quickly get something out that works, but there are definitely misspellings and grammatical errors, but nothing…

What do you mean O'Reilly doesn't make books anymore? I've read books from them recently.

They don't sell their books themselves anymore, only a digital subscription (so you need to buy from bookstores etc), parent might have been thinking of that.

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#22

Post by afraca »

nickdrozd wrote: post #16

> I also got to pick the cover image from one of three suggestions the publisher sent me. Manning uses images of historical figures on the covers of their books ... I picked the image of the woman carrying clothes as I thought it was at least somewhat related to a transport protocol carrying messages (a stretch I know but I was rather pleased with myself for coming up with that analogy to justify the cover image some…

Meta: I would appreciate it if quotes are accompanied by some explanation of why you chose it.

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#23

Post by timClicks »

afraca wrote: post #22
nickdrozd wrote: post #16

> I also got to pick the cover image from one of three suggestions the publisher sent me. Manning uses images of historical figures on the covers of their books ... I picked the image of the woman carrying clothes as I thought it was at least somewhat related to a transport protocol carrying messages (a stretch I know but I was rather pleased with myself for coming up with that analogy to justify the cover image some…

Meta: I would appreciate it if quotes are accompanied by some explanation of why you chose it.

I choose the cover of Rust in Action because the subject is carrying lots of things, a hint towards concurrency. I also think that she's probably doing some sort of chore, which is the kind of work that gets done with Rust. She's also from the Caucus mountains, an area I would love to visit.

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#24

Post by softwaredoug »

I wrote a book for Manning (Relevant Search). It was a grueling process. I can confirm much that's in here. I will say that I generally felt Manning

(a) really understood how to craft good tech books

(b) was really dedicated to tech books as a medium, despite all the attempts to 'disrupt books' which I respected

(c) was full of dedicated people that treated this as their craft

The other point I'll make is the author's name goes on the cover, but the work is really a team effort between dedicated editors, the publisher, reviewers, and others. No part is replaceable.

If I was to write another book, I'd definitely consider doing it with them. Not because they made it easy, but because they really were dedicated to the quality I wanted in my book

I also loved their super old school, Web 1.0, "we just do books" website 5 years ago :)

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#25

Post by 4thaccount »

detaro wrote: post #21
stephenbez wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean O'Reilly doesn't make books anymore? I've read books from them recently.

They don't sell their books themselves anymore, only a digital subscription (so you need to buy from bookstores etc), parent might have been thinking of that.

This. They still make content, but I believe it's all digital.

I don't think they create paper books anymore. Is that incorrect?

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#26

Post by louthy »

softwaredoug wrote: post #24

I wrote a book for Manning (Relevant Search). It was a grueling process. I can confirm much that's in here. I will say that I generally felt Manning (a) really understood how to craft good tech books (b) was really dedicated to tech books as a medium, despite all the attempts to 'disrupt books' which I respected (c) was full of dedicated people that treated this as their craft The other point I'll make is the author'…

I was a technical proofer for a Manning book, and I concur with all of your points. They’re super professional and dedicated to getting the best outcome (a useful book)

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#27

Post by detaro »

4thaccount wrote: post #25
detaro wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't sell their books themselves anymore, only a digital subscription (so you need to buy from bookstores etc), parent might have been thinking of that.

This. They still make content, but I believe it's all digital. I don't think they create paper books anymore. Is that incorrect?

From what I understand they still make books, they just don't sell them directly anymore. Amazon has them. (Unless they abandoned that in the meantime too and I missed it happening)

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#28

Post by perlgeek »

I've written three books for Apress, and their process seems to be a bit leaner (less review), so more of the book quality is the author's responsibility.

The technical reviewers were good, but certainly not world experts on the topics.

I didn't get any say in the cover images, just a proposal to which they showed me.

---

Regarding the topic of writer's block, my advice is to write blog posts instead of book chapters first. Depending on your contract, you might or might not be allowed to actually publish them, but if you did a bit of blogging first, you are likely used to writing blog posts, so the idea is not as scary as writing a book chapter.

You can do enough editing later, but starting from blog posts gives the chapters some independence that I as a reader appreciate.

Re: Writing a Technical Book for Manning

#29

Post by raboukhalil »

If you want to hear about the alternative approach of self-publishing, check out my post about how I wrote a WebAssembly book in 200 hours: https://medium.com/@robaboukhalil/how-i-wrote-a-technical-bo...

This is my second self-published book and I've loved this approach. It lets me focus on writing and marketing, and I get to craft every aspect of the book.

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