Having been awarded my PhD - yeehah! - the next project was to turn the thesis into a book. I've hit something of a brick wall with this, and would appreciate advice. I have been talking to a potential publisher (a very reputable one in my field), who expressed interest in a proposal. But I am getting nowhere in my department with advice on the proposal.

I had a chat with my internal examiner (who turned his own thesis into a book) months ago, and went away and worked on the proposal as a result of that, but my request for a follow-up meeting hasn't received a reply. I'm not sure how far I should be nagging him about this.

Both my supervisors have now left the department/retired, and to be honest, based on their respective publications records, they aren't the best people to give advice on this.

I've searched online for examples of 'thesis to book' proposals in my subject, but without much success, and a trawl of the university library shelves was similarly fruitless.

I was given a small (but much appreciated) award by an external organisation towards the expenses of turning the thesis into a book, and I feel quite bad that this is dragging on so long after they had enough faith in me to make the grant.

I'm thinking about just sending the proposal in to the publisher as it is, but would appreciate any advice this forum can offer.

If you haven't read or glanced at Dunleavy's 'Authoring a PhD' then it's probably too late; but chapter nine would help you.

Think it's wrong to expect that all PhDs will make a book, and even wronger to expect that a lot of work isn't needed to produce a monograph.

Eds - thanks, the final part of that chapter in Dunleavy's work is very helpful.

After posting on 4 November, I realised that I suffered from 'I don't like to bother people' syndrome, and decided to be somewhat more proactive. I approached someone else in my dept, and was delighted to get a very fast and friendly response; we're meeting up next week. I also approached the postgraduate office (which administers research degrees across the whole university) and they will put me in touch with people elsewhere in the university, if necessary, though they wouldn't be specialists in my field.

There will be a book eventually. The body that made the award obviously thought so, as did my examiners at the viva. I trust their opinion - now to put the work in.