How to Write a Tech Book (Unabridged‪)‬

Many technical professionals would like to write a book sharing their knowledge and experience, but most haven't. If you ask them why, it's not from lack of ideas or experience with technical subject matter. Instead, they just don't know how turn their idea into an actual published book. Even though there are some guides for publishing nonfiction books, tech books are unique in the publishing world, and there haven't been any guides that tackle the special process that goes into publishing a tech book. This book aims to change that.

Rankin has authored and published a dozen books across multiple traditional tech publishers and also through self-publishing. This book distills his experience into an easy-to-follow guide that explains the full book writing and publishing process step-by-step. Topics include vetting ideas, creating an outline, pitching a publisher, writing a draft, editing, formatting, publishing, marketing, and planning future revisions.

"I wish that when I had started my journey I had found a book like this one," says Matthew Helmke, Principal Technical Writer at StarTree.ai and the author of many technical books including Ubuntu Linux Unleashed (Pearson, 2021).

Table of Contents

Part I: Getting Started

Chapter 1: The Idea

Chapter 2: Outline

Chapter 3: Getting A Publisher

Part II: Writing

Chapter 4: The First Draft

Chapter 5: Formatting and Layout

Chapter 6: Editing and Finishing Touches

Part III: Publishing

Chapter 7: Publishing and Promotion

Chapter 8: Royalties

Chapter 9: Revisions 

Appendix A: An Example LaTeX Chapter