Books about scholarly writing

Wow, I wish that were a more fun-sounding title. For many of us, research is a large part of what draws us into the profession. Then (for many of us, not all of course) we head out into the world with a less-than-clear idea of how to write a publishable article.


It's not that our ideas aren't good. It's just that, you know, it needs to sound right. There need to be scholarly footnotes. Lots of scholarly footnotes. And (in my experience) it needs to be an idea that meets a certain standard of proof, rather than the sort of fun notions we play around with in seminars or in conversations with friends.


As a big fan of the Academic Job Search Handbook, I am on a hunt for the ideal book on scholarly writing. Some candidates:


Writing Your Journal Article in 12 Weeks
I got this from interlibrary loan in a previous job. I gleaned some helpful things from it, but it's of limited usefulness unless you're in a position to follow their schedule (take an unrevised paper or dissertation chapter and revise it in 12 weeks).


Professors as Writers: a Self-Help Guide to Productive Writing
The only real thing I have against this book is that it sounds like something that would be handed out at new faculty orientation. The first review makes it sound ideal, though: "all of us academics would like to think that someday a muse will descend upon us and infuse us with the capability to write the great work in our field without self-doubt, procrastination, etc. Boice shows empirical evidence that demonstrates these hopes are in vain (which is no big surprise to anyone), but even better, he provides the solution: writing is like physical exercise--the more you do it, the easier and more pleasant it becomes--if you write a little bit every day, even if you think it's pointless, at the end of a six month period, you will have 150 pages of writing to edit." Actually, I'm quite tempted to order it after reading that.


How to Write a Lot: A Guide to Productive Academic Writing
This book came up quite a bit in reviews of other works about writing. From the comments, it seems more on the motivational than specific side. It appears to be especially effective at arguing procrastinators out of their rationalizations. (We've all -- or almost all -- been there). If you're starting from scratch in terms of writing regularly, this book may be for you.


If there are other books that have inspired you as an academic writer, please do share them in the comments.


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