Thread by @lportwoodstacer

If you need to write a summary of a book chapter (you’ll definitely need to do this in your book proposal, you might also want to do it in your book’s introduction) here are the 6 elements I suggest including:

1. Working title of the chapter. If you’re at the proposal stage, don’t worry about the title changing later, it’s fine.

2. Topic of the chapter - a few words to answer the question “what’s this chapter about?”

3. The argument you make about the chapter’s topic, or if it’s more of a context/history chapter, what main point you want readers to understand. Don’t assume the chapter topic speaks for itself — ppl want to know *why* they should read the chapter & the arg tells them why

4. The objects you analyze in the chapter and the methods you use. What this looks like will vary by field. It might be the sources you drew on, the texts you read, the people you talked to, the data set you’re using as evidence, etc.

The next two things are often left out, but including them will make your book seem very well conceived and organized (i.e. editors, peer reviewers, and your ultimate readers will appreciate them a lot if you can work them in)

5. The relationship between the chapter’s main point/argument and your book’s overall thesis. If you can explain this, it’ll solidify the sense that the chapter is a *necessary* component of the book and worth the reader’s time

6. The chapter’s relation to other chapters / its place in the overall arc of the book. This can be a sentence or less. It might be some transitional words at the start of the summary explaining how we’re progressing/shifting from the previous chapter

You can do all of this (1–6) in a paragraph, maybe 2 paras if you want to expand a bit on the evidence/analysis part. For a proposal, expanding is probably a good idea, to make the book feel fleshed out, esp for those who won’t get a chance to read the whole manuscript

If it takes you more than a paragraph or two to explain what’s in a chapter and what purpose it’s serving in your book, that might suggest you have material for more than one chapter on your hands, or that you need to think a bit more about how the parts of yr book fit together

There’s more on how to write an annotated table of contents in The Book Proposal Book, of course. 🤓 See Chapter 7. Bookproposalbook.com