On Wed, 11 Apr 2001, Kelton Rhoads wrote:
<SNIP>
> I'd also like to point out how easy that research would be, if such a
> book were written by a listmember. Said listmember would have all the
> contacts necessary, right here! But there might be an even better,
> easier, more satisfactory way of making a high-quality OM book. Chris
> said:
>
> >> A successful book could not be a compendium of contributions from
> interested parties.
>
> In my field there are thousands of highly successful multi-author books.
> By a "multi-author" book, I mean a book that is a compilation of chapters
> on distinct but related topics, written by different experts, and then
> edited by a single person (or two or three) for consistency of style. In
> my field, these books are highly prized because they represent a variety
> of expert authors, each writing in his or her area of acknowledged
> expertise. (In fact, I just finished writing a chapter in such an
> multi-author book myself. I was one author of perhaps 12 who wrote the
> book; each one of us had a single chapter and a single topic for which we
> were responsible, but each chapter integrated into the overall theme of
> the book. Each of us had space and stylistic constraints to which we had
> to conform, so a uniform structure was imposed by the author.)
I'd second Kelton's wise remarks. Being in a field where multi-author
books are the rule more than the exception (save for elementary
introductory-level text-books), I agree that such an approach can work -
very well, even. I'd strongly encourage and support anyone, who would take
upon himself the role of editor of such a piece. I'd probably also buy a
few copies in the end "just because".....
Someone, go fot it. Kelton, did I hear you volunteering? ;)
--
-------------------------------------------
Thomas Heide Clausen
Civilingeniør i Datateknik (cand.polyt)
M.Sc in Computer Engineering
E-Mail: T.Clausen@xxxxxxxxxxxx
WWW: http://www.cs.auc.dk/~voop
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