I found out a second edition of our book is due out this Fall. Sadly, I didn't find out from the Editor, but instead from one of the new authors who was calling me asking if the Editor at the publishing house had a habit of acting weird in his interactions with Rob and I. I told the new author to relax: there is something in the water at publishing houses. Or, perhaps in the air as tech book editors all act as if they've been doing following the Dead and doing Whippets for the past 15 years.
With regards to our book, the toughest part of writing the book was/is negative feedback. While some of the reviews are positive, we do get mighty flamed in a number of them -- especially on Amazon. Are these reviews deserved? Yes, I think so. The book was the best we could do in the situation and also given our talents/skills at the time. We were both working full-time at BEA. I was overcoming serious tendinitis in my wrists. Rob was fighting a lack of motivation. We were both trying to ship a new version of the product (WebLogic). I was traveling and so on.
Don't get me wrong: I'm proud of our book but I think it could have been better. What would I have done differently?
1) Optimal Number of Authors: With a tech programming book, you don't have months to go through reviews. Technology just moves so fast that you have to move fast in publishing the book. You spend too much time, you miss your window of opportunity. Given also that we were working full-time, we needed more help. Two people is just too few, even with a good editor working on your side. Really, I think 4-5 is optimal. More than that, the coordination overhead becomes overwhelming. We (Sadly) had to exchange quality for time -- the book had too many bugs and we could have done better with more people.
2) More Research: We really should have spent more time out interviewing customers and users of the product. It's critical to research, research, research for any book (even if you are the foremost expert on something). As "experts" on the product, we did only research inside BEA and our own heads. This is just a glaring ommission and something we should have done better.
3) Dedication: The process of writing a book is a mentally draining activity. It's really tough. But, I think that process if made much easier if you can dedicate yourself completely to the process. So, making book-writing your full-time job (not your second job!) is critical. Unfortunately, the stock was pretty high then, so we had no real choice on this matter.
There are a bunch of things we did correctly that most authors don't do:
1) Editor on Our Side: Luckily, we were referred a woman (Sandra Emerson) who was/is a real pro at editing. The publishers of tech books don't do jack of wordsmithing and organizing the text. I recommend having such a person. Sandra also knew the in's-out's of relations with the publisher. We developed a much more favorable contract with them because she was on our side negotiating.
2) Clear Organization: This goes without saying, but a bookwriting project must start with the most detailed outline you can generate. We spent a bunch of effort putting this together and it paid off. Most publishing houses demand an outline, but it's best to make one even more detailed than they ask. Our outline was 4 levels deep, meaning that every section header was written in our outline beforehand. Writing the book was just a process of filling in the blanks.
3) Multiple Pitches: We pitched the book amongst multiple publishing houses and were able to get them competing on the book. It's critical (even if a publishing house approaches you with an idea) to shop it around. Note: check that they haven't copyrighted anything before you do so, talk to your lawyer, etc...
I do believe that this WebLogic book was the best book I've written because of the things we did right. The next book would be even better with my lessons learned. I do feel good about that. Some things do get better with practice.
(On a side note, reflecting on the call I mentioned before reminds me of something I've noticed since my departure from Silicon Valley; an inadvertant social experiment perhaps. Starting about 1 year out of the Valley, folks who contact me from the Valley formed two distinct groups. All called and expressed interest in me personally and my little life. However, a distinct segment followed that expressed interest with a request for a favor. What I guess was suprising was how large the "needy" segment is. So, this leads me to my little Girdley Maxim #1: You don't know for sure who is friend and who is co-worker until you're 12 months out of a job. Perhaps it's expected, but it was something I just noticed and since it's my lame Blog, I get to write whatever I want even if it is obvious...)
