Inside Book Brilliance: A Full Walkthrough

Introduction to Book Brilliance

Hello. Hello, everyone. I hope you’re having a good day. Today’s episode is gonna be a little bit different than our other episodes because I am going to give you a walkthrough of my program Book Brilliance. So Book Brilliance is my new-ish coaching program. It is formally known as Elevate, and it is a book coaching and writing program for women and non-binary scholars who wanna transform their dissertations into scholarly books without working twice as hard as everybody else.

And what I’m gonna do today is tell you about the program — what you can expect if you join — and give you a little bit of a behind-the-scenes look at it. So let’s get into that.

What This Podcast Is About

Welcome to Academic Book Writing Simplified. I’m your host, a writing coach and developmental editor who’s here to give you some tough love about the way you write. This podcast is for women and non-binary scholars in academia who are writing academic books but feel as if the process is a little or a lot like a mystery. If you’re ready to trade your confusion and frustration for ease, clarity, and purpose, you’re in the right place. Let’s head into today’s episode.

Starting the Program: Writing First

The program is a six-month program, and how it starts is that, of course, we start with curriculum — a full curriculum of worksheets, video lessons, and live lessons that we deliver to you.

And how we start the program is with writing instruction. It’s a little bit counterintuitive because a lot of people expect that when you get into a book writing program, the first thing you’re going to do is project management — figure out timelines and writing tasks. But we don’t do that. We start with the writing.

The Book Overview

We start with the book overview — a one-page document that serves as the intellectual agenda for your book. In that document, we help you nail your argument, why it matters, and who should read your book.

This gives you a big-picture view: what it’s about, what you’re arguing, why it matters, and who it’s for. You’ll notice that this is exactly what you have to put in a book proposal — and it helps you avoid that deer-in-headlights moment when someone asks, “What’s your book about?”

Developing Your Framework

Once we finish the overview, we work on your framework. This is where you learn to situate your work in the appropriate intellectual conversations and develop the analytical tools you’ll need — your concepts, literatures, and theories. We help you narrow those down to define your readership and figure out how you’re going to speak to them.

We help you establish your framework and your argument within the first thirty days. And you might be thinking, “That’s a really short amount of time.” My response? Yes, you are — because we are going to help you.

Editorial Feedback and Support

We workshop with you and provide editorial feedback — a huge part of the program. Twice a month, you get feedback from a developmental editor. We’re helping you figure it out, revise it, tweak it, and make sure it’s worded so that it makes sense.

Writing Your Book Outline

Within the first sixty days, you write your book outline. This becomes your main document for the book. We work with a lot of people who’ve never outlined before and end up loving it.

We’re both evangelists and agnostic about outlining: we want you to have a structure, but we don’t prescribe what it looks like. It could be a mind map, a formal outline, bullet points — whatever works for you. Our approach is to help you find your best way.

The Outline as Your Anchor

With your outline, you’ll know what to write, where to put it, and how to develop your through line — so you don’t get halfway through and ask, “How is this all connected again?” We make sure that doesn’t happen.

Choose Your Own Adventure

After the first sixty days, the next four months are where the program becomes a choose-your-own-adventure. Some people dive into chapters; others focus on proposals. Some work on both simultaneously.

We help you decide based on your tenure timeline, work-life balance, and other responsibilities — and then we create your writing plan.

Project Management and Writing Tasks

Once you decide your project, we go into project management. We help you develop your writing plan and writing tasks. The outline helps you see what you need to do and when.

Instead of vague goals like “finish chapter three,” you’ll have specific tasks like, “write two vignettes for section two” or “analyze data using a concept from the framework.”

This specificity helps you better estimate your time — no more two-hour tasks that take eight, or one-day projects that last a month.

Planning From Your Writing

This is key: your writing informs your planning. Planning isn’t a separate activity. It emerges from your actual work and integrates with what ends up on the page.

More on Writing and Project Management Instruction

Of course, we cover more writing instruction: how to write a proposal, how to write for specific audiences, how to work with feedback. We also have a full project management mini-course called Jumpstart that helps with your publication timeline, structuring writing sessions, managing energy, using writing sprints, and more.

Mindset Coaching

The final part of our curriculum is mindset coaching. This is not therapy, but it helps with key academic challenges — procrastination, fear, boundaries, and hostile feedback.

Especially for women, non-binary scholars, and those from minoritized backgrounds, we help you process feedback and decide how to respond. It’s about equipping you to continue your work — not solving systemic problems alone, but supporting your ability to keep writing.

Editing Support

In addition to writing, planning, and mindset coaching, you also get editing. Refer to our last episode with our developmental editor, Kali, for more on how editing works.

But here’s the summary: you can submit your work for feedback twice a month. We’re always looking at your work. We’re nosy — in the best way — and want to know everything. That consistent editing helps you make quick progress and decisions.

We don’t just give notes; we workshop with you, ask questions, point you to curriculum, and guide you through next steps.

Supporting First and Second Books

Most people in the program are writing their first book, though about 20% are working on their second or third. Writing a book is different from articles, dissertations, or grants — it requires a new kind of support.

We help you develop a book-sized argument with the sophistication needed for publication. We provide instruction, feedback, and a process to ensure your work is submission-ready.

How the Program Is Delivered

This all happens through a series of live calls. As of February, we meet three Thursdays a month, giving you time to write and get feedback. This is an implementation program — not just theory about writing books. Our goal is: write the book.

Learn More and Wrap-Up

If this sounds interesting, we’re open for enrollment at the time of this episode’s release. The link to learn more is in the show notes.

Check out the last episode for more on editing, and listen to other episodes if you want to know more about my coaching style and the step-by-step approach we use in the program. Think of each episode as a mini-preview of what we do in Book Brilliance.

Final Thoughts

I hope you found this helpful if you’ve been curious about what happens once you join Book Brilliance. I’m super nosy too, so I love behind-the-scenes info. Whether you’re just curious or seriously considering, the show notes have more details.

Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. Remember, writing an academic book is challenging, but that doesn’t mean you have to overcomplicate it.

If you liked what you heard, please leave a review — it helps others find the podcast so we can continue the conversation.

Take care, and tune in for our next episode.