About Us

We’re Katelyn and Allison, and we have years of experience helping scholars navigate the messy process of writing books. We met in graduate school and became friends and writing partners. Katelyn is an associate professor of French at the University of Central Arkansas, and Allison is a developmental editor who works with academic clients. Based on her experience of writing and publishing her first book with Liverpool University Press, Katelyn created an online curriculum for first-time book authors—what she wished had existed when she was going through the process—and brought Allison on board to help run it as a summer workshop conducted over Zoom.

In the workshop’s subsequent iterations, we tested the core exercises with hundreds of projects, brought to us by authors from all kinds of situations and with a wide variety of challenges. Based on what we learned, we repeatedly revised the curriculum. The result is The Dissertation-to-Book Workbook.

The Workbook

You’re writing your first academic book. You’ve read all the advice books; you’ve written a dissertation; you may even have attended webinars on how to write your proposal and pitch your book to publishers. You know you need to revise what you have. But when you sit down at your desk, what do you actually do?

The Dissertation-to-Book Workbook is the answer. In a series of practical, actionable steps, we show you how to distill your core argument, discover an organizational schema that works, and recognize what each chapter adds to the story. We even give you a method for drafting and revising new material. By the end, you’ll have a solid understanding of what you need to prioritize, how to thread your core ideas through each chapter, and what work remains to be done. If you’re looking for a way to grasp your book’s big picture and use what you learn to guide your revision process, this workbook is for you.

At the heart of this workbook is an unconventional process of developing your book argument using what we call “book questions” and “chapter answers”: two or three core questions that receive a one-sentence answer for each chapter. This framework, as you’ll see, is a powerful tool for aligning your book’s evidence with its claims.

Workshops for Individual Book Authors

8-Week Book Chapter Shortcut

In this facilitated 8-week Book Chapter Shortcut, you’ll work alongside a cohort of authors to repurpose your writing into a solid draft of a book chapter. This course is designed for authors who have existing writing (notes, a dissertation chapter, conference papers, seminar papers) and need to revise that writing into a publishable chapter. It is NOT designed for authors who merely have an idea for a chapter but have not yet written material.

During the 8-week facilitated cohort, there will be four 90-minute coworking workshops, designed to help you make faster progress than you ever thought possible. In the even-numbered weeks, we’ll host an office hour during which time we’ll answer questions and troubleshoot challenges.

You will need a copy of The Dissertation-to-Book Workbook to participate. We will work through Chapters 14 and 15 of the workbook.

6-Week Facilitated Dissertation-to-Book Workbook Experience (June-July 2024)

In this facilitated workshop, which features live support, accountability, and troubleshooting twice per week for 6 weeks (Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1-2 pm Eastern / 10-11 am Pacific), we guide participants through Phase I of the Dissertation-to-Book Workbook (corresponding to Chapters 1–13). The workshop is designed for book authors who want practical steps, expert guidance, and peer support as they get the big-picture view of their book manuscript. To benefit from the workshop, authors should have some of their ideas (substantial parts of at least 50% of their chapters) down on paper already in the form of dissertation chapters, notes, conference papers, journal articles, and so on. Via conversations and hands-on exercises, participants will evaluate their book’s scope and organizing principle, draft answerable research questions, produce chapter snapshots, describe their narrative arc, and assemble an argument, which then, in turn, helps them identify what to cut and what to keep, and much more. You will work ON your book manuscript to develop confidence in your project. This workshop requires you to spend about 6 hours per week on writing exercises at your own pace outside the scheduled support, encouragement, and troubleshooting calls. And if the times of the calls don’t work for you, no worries! You’ll have access to the replays and can ask Katelyn & Allison questions and get support, advice, and feedback via a discussion board. Take 15% off through May 8.

Please note that you will not work IN your manuscript or chapters. For opportunities to revise your chapters, see our “Chapter Shortcut” cohort.

Other Workshops

We regularly give workshops on various topics related to book project conception, manuscript revision, and book publishing for individual book authors. Enter your email below, and we’ll let you know when future registrations open!

Recent Workshop Replays

Interested in inviting us to your institution or conference? Check out the institutional workshops we offer.

Free Resources

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