A Decade of Writing Books and Selling 25,000 Copies
Reflecting on the Journey and Impact of Writing Technical Books.
Ten years ago, I embarked on a journey that profoundly shaped my career and personal growth. Writing my first book, The Hacker's Guide to Python (later updated and renamed Serious Python), marked the beginning of a series of literary endeavors that allowed me to share my knowledge, experiences, and passion for Python programming with a global audience. Today, I reflect on this journey, the lessons learned, and the incredible milestones achieved along the way.
The Genesis: The Hacker's Guide to Python
In March 2014, I published my first book, The Hacker's Guide to Python. This book was born out of a desire to provide a comprehensive resource for Python developers, offering insights and techniques I had gathered over the years. The response was overwhelmingly positive, and it motivated me to continue writing and sharing my expertise. I sold over 3,000 copies of the book in a couple of years, which is a very good number in its category.
Challenges and Time Investment
Writing was an enormous undertaking that demanded significant time and effort. I spent around 150 hours on each book, covering various activities from writing and editing to marketing and publishing. The process was spread over a year most of the time.
One of the toughest challenges was constructing a coherent and comprehensive table of contents. This initial step was crucial, as it guided the entire writing process, making the subsequent task of filling in the blanks somewhat more manageable. Additionally, I had to balance my time between my day job as a software engineer and this side project, making time management a critical aspect of the endeavor.
Another significant difficulty was the proofreading process. I needed both technical and language reviews to ensure the content was accurate and well-written, considering English is not my native language. Finding reliable reviewers who could provide timely and constructive feedback was challenging. Despite reaching out to many contacts, only a fraction responded and contributed consistently.
Self-publishing also taught me marketing, one of the best skills I could have learned, and I’m still leveraging it to this day while working on Mergify.
Scaling Python and Serious Python
Following the success of my first book, I continued exploring new topics and challenges within the Python ecosystem. Scaling Python, published in 2017, delved into the complexities of scaling applications, a topic that resonated with many developers facing similar challenges. I distributed around 1,000 copies of this book.
In 2019, after being approached by No Starch, I released Serious Python, a book aimed at helping developers write more efficient, maintainable, and scalable code. Both books received praise for their practical approach and in-depth coverage of advanced topics. Being backed by No Starch helped the book to be distributed widely, and made it reach 20,000 copies as of today.
Impact on My Career
Writing these books significantly impacted my career and established me as an authority in the Python community. When I joined Datadog in 2019, I remember seeing my books casually lying around at the entrance of the Paris office.
This moment was a profound realization of the reach and influence of my work. Colleagues and peers often treated the content of my books as definitive guides. The books provided answers and insights so clearly that people often didn't feel the need to ask me questions about the topics I covered during interviews; they trusted my written word as a reliable source. This validation opened new opportunities and allowed me to connect with an extensive network of professionals who recognized and respected my expertise.
Connecting with the Community
Writing allowed me to talk to anyone, reach out to amazing hackers worldwide, and forge new friendships. Writing books was the best excuse to meet fantastic people and create new friendships. I discovered fantastic engineers and learned from their experiences while interviewing them. This journey has been incredibly rewarding, not just professionally but also personally, as I connected with a vibrant community of developers who share my passion for Python and open-source software.
I also saw my books being translated into multiple languages, including Chinese and Korean.
This feeling is awesome as it gives even more impact to your writing, knowing that your knowledge is spreading across the globe. Having your work translated and accessible to a wider audience is a great reward, and it emphasizes the importance and value of sharing knowledge on such a large scale.
The Joy of Writing
While writing is hard, it is also refreshing. Producing content that people love and are happy to recommend is a fantastic feeling. My golden rule was, and still is:
Produce content that you'd be happy consuming.
The rest then becomes history. This philosophy guided me through the writing process and ensured that my books remained valuable and relevant to readers.
A New Era of Writing
Reflecting on my writing journey, it resonates deeply with a post I wrote titled "I used to write.” In that post, I shared my journey from writing extensively in my early years to facing the challenges of balancing life and work, decreasing my writing output. The desire to return to the keyboard lingered, and despite the rise of AI-generated content, I realized that authentic, human writing still holds immense value.
Over the last year, I toyed with GPT, generating tons of content and using it to brainstorm, change sentences, and rewrite text. This experimentation reaffirmed my belief that AI could never truly replace the nuanced and creative process of human writing. As AI-generated content grows, the need for genuine, human-crafted writing becomes even more critical. This new writing era challenges us to strengthen our signal amidst the growing noise.
The past ten years have been an incredible journey of learning, teaching, and connecting with developers worldwide. I look forward to continuing this journey, exploring new topics, and sharing my insights through future books and blog posts.
Thank you for being a part of this journey.