How to Write a Textbook Proposal (with Template)

A textbook proposal has one job: to let an editor who has never sat in your classroom see the book you see. It does not need to be long — most run five to fifteen pages plus a sample chapter — but every section has to answer a question the editor is silently asking. This guide takes the nine sections publishers ask for, explains the question behind each one, and shows what a strong answer looks like. A free fill-in template and checklist follows the same structure.

Before you write: the two things editors read first

Whatever order your proposal is in, an acquisitions editor will look for two things within the first minute: which course adopts this book, and what students in that course use today. If those two answers are specific and honest, the rest of the proposal gets a careful read. If they are vague, the rest rarely rescues it. Write those two paragraphs first, and make sure they appear on page one.

Section 1 — Overview

The question: what is this book, in one breath?

Give the working title, a subtitle if it helps, and a single paragraph that says what the book teaches, to whom, and why it is needed now. Resist the urge to describe your field's importance; describe the book. A useful test: could a colleague who teaches the same course repeat your paragraph to a department meeting?

Weak: "Statistics is essential to the modern nursing profession, and this book provides comprehensive coverage of statistical methods."
Strong: "An introductory statistics text for pre-licensure nursing students, built around the clinical questions they will actually face — reading a drug trial, interpreting a screening result — rather than the mathematics-first sequence of general statistics texts."

Section 2 — Audience and course level

The question: who assigns this, and how many of them are there?

Name the course or courses, the level (introductory undergraduate, upper-level, graduate, professional), the prerequisites students arrive with, and the typical enrolment. If the course goes by different names at different institutions, list the variants. If the book could serve a second market — a related course, a professional certificate, practitioners — say so, but be clear about which is primary. Publishers are wary of books that claim to serve everyone.

Include a sentence about the institution types where the course is taught (community colleges, four-year colleges, research universities, professional schools). It affects everything from reading level to price.

Section 3 — Table of contents

The question: does the author see the whole book?

A chapter-by-chapter outline with one or two sentences per chapter is worth more than any amount of prose about your approach. It shows sequence, proportion and level at a glance. If chapters group into parts, show the parts. If the sequence deliberately departs from convention — teaching hypothesis testing before probability, say — a sentence explaining why belongs here.

Add an estimate of length (pages or words) and of the number of figures and tables. Editors use these to think about price and production, and unrealistic estimates are an early warning sign.

Section 4 — Comparable titles

The question: does the author know the market, and is there room?

This is the section most often done badly, in one of two ways: claiming there is no competition, or dismissing it. Both cost credibility, because the editor will look the books up. Instead:

• List the two or three books instructors in this course actually assign — title, author, publisher, edition.
• Say what each does well. Be generous; it is a sign you have read them.
• Then say, concretely, what yours does differently. Approach, sequence, level, coverage, length, price, exercises, format, interactivity — pick the ones that are true and that would make an instructor switch.

"No competing book exists" is occasionally true for a new course. If so, explain what instructors use instead — a packet of readings, a book from an adjacent field, nothing — because that is the competition.

Section 5 — Your background

The question: can this author write this book, and will instructors trust it?

Two or three short paragraphs: your position and institution; the courses you teach that relate to the book, and for how long; relevant publications, teaching awards or course materials that have been adopted elsewhere. If you have co-authors, describe each one's role. This is not a CV; attach one if the publisher asks.

Teaching experience counts here at least as much as research. An instructor who has taught the course twelve times and knows exactly where students stumble is, for a textbook, the more valuable credential.

Section 6 — Manuscript status and timeline

The question: how real is this, and when?

Say plainly where the manuscript stands: idea and outline only; syllabus, notes and slides; a partial draft (and how much); or a complete draft. List the existing materials you can draw on — lecture notes, problem sets, lab manuals, videos — because they change the schedule. Then give a realistic date for a complete draft. Editors would much rather hear "eighteen months" now than "six months" followed by a year of silence.

Section 7 — Interactive and supplementary ambitions

The question: what does the course need beyond the pages?

Two parts. First, ancillaries: solutions, slides, test items, instructor guides — what the course needs and what you can provide. Second, if the book will have a digital or interactive edition, where would doing beat reading? Name the concepts students find hardest and what would help: a simulation to vary, a calculator to try, a self-check with immediate feedback, a worked example that unfolds step by step. You need not design these now; showing that you have thought about them tells a publisher you understand how students learn, and it is the raw material an instructional designer starts from.

Section 8 — The sample chapter

The question: can the author actually write at this level, for these students?

Send one complete chapter, including its exercises. Choose the chapter that best represents the book's voice and difficulty — often a middle chapter, not the introduction, which tends to be the least typical. Rough figures are fine; missing exercises are not, because the exercises are where an editor sees whether the book teaches. Flag any third-party material with its source.

Section 9 — Practicalities

How to reach you, the best times to talk, and whether the proposal is with other publishers (say so; it is normal). If you have a deadline of your own — a sabbatical, a course redesign — mention it.

Seven mistakes that get good proposals declined

1. No named course. "For students of biology" is not a market.
2. Dismissing the competition, or claiming there is none without explaining what instructors use instead.
3. A table of contents that is a list of topics rather than a sequence of chapters with proportion and level.
4. Level drift between the overview (introductory) and the sample chapter (graduate).
5. An unrealistic timeline — or none.
6. A sample chapter without exercises.
7. Length. A forty-page proposal signals that the author cannot summarise, which is a worrying trait in a textbook writer. Aim for the shortest proposal that answers every question above.

The ten-question final check

Before you send it, read the proposal against these — they are the questions an editor asks first.

1. Can I name the course this book is for in one sentence?
2. Does the outline show the shape of the whole book?
3. Have I named the books students use today, honestly?
4. Is it clear what this book does that those do not?
5. Does my background explain why I am the person to write it?
6. Have I said plainly where the manuscript stands?
7. Is the length realistic for the course?
8. Have I described the students, not just the subject?
9. Would a colleague in my department recognise the need?
10. Have I included a way to reach me and the best time to talk?

Get the template

The Textbook Proposal Template & Checklist lays out these nine sections as a fill-in document, with the checklists above built in. It mirrors the questions in our own online proposal form, so if you decide to propose the book to Linus Learning your answers carry straight over — and if you would rather start with a conversation, an editor will read a two-sentence description and reply personally.