Book Structure

Considering “The Impact of 3D Printing” as a possible subject for a book. Also giving consideration to different book structures, division into chapters, and basic metrics per chapter, per paragraph, to support an argument, to make points, provide insights, and to cite sources. I wrote a 10-page article a while back that was divided into four main sections wrapped by an introduction and a conclusion. Simple. Each of the sections barely scratched the surface and I had a single source cited in the introduction. For a book-length project, 200-300 pages, I simply can’t begin without defining an overall structure.

How many sources? How about ten books (or sources) per chapter? A 10-chapter book would then cite 100 books (or sources). If each chapter devotes 5 paragraphs to a book or to a source, that works out to 50 paragraphs per chapter. A five-paragraph treatment of a book is a mini-essay. Let's say a mini-essay is structured as an opening argument paragraph, followed by three supporting paragraphs, and a conclusion paragraph. Since a single page accommodates around 2 paragraphs, and a full chapter would contain 50 paragraphs, every 2 mini-essays would span 2 double-sided pages or 15 pages per chapter. You can then think of the book as a series of 5-paragraph, 2 and a half page mini-essays. The book would contain 10 x 10 (10 mini-essays x 10 chapters), or one-hundred mini-essays. That’s 150 pages. With a 10-page intro and a 10-page conclusion, that’s a 170 page book right there.

So I would need to focus on writing 5-paragraph mini-essays. Once I write 100 of these and connect them, I will have a book length work. How long will it take? I think I can write 2 high quality mini-essays per week. I’m talking really polished here. That’s just 10 paragraphs a week, or, 50 weeks total. That also works out to 4 essays per month, or, a chapter every 2.5 months.

Now, this breakdown is calculated as if I were making steady progress like a well-calibrated little writing machine. But I know that I will write absolutely nothing on some days, not a word, and maybe write 5-times the required daily average on others.