I'm thinking of going self-employed. Some people I've spoken to consider this unwise; and have asked me to check if there's any demand for the product I wish to produce.

I want to write a book on Clifford Algebra or "Geometric Algebra". Some of you know that it's a mathematical formalism that unifies quaternions, complex numbers, Plucker coordinates, and some other things.

My perspective on CA is different from other books'. For instance, I'm not a fan of the idea that an element of a CA is a formal sum of vectors and scalars and bi-vectors. These formal summations are confusing, and I believe they can be done away with. I prefer the idea that an element of a CA is some kind of transformation. From a Lie theoretic point of view, there's a correspondence between Clifford Algebras and Spin groups.

Another cool think I'd like to spell out in this book, is the connection between Clifford Algebras and Synthetic Geometry (this is the type of geometry that the Ancient Greeks did). I think each Clifford Algebra can be associated to a set of geometric construction tools (like compasses, straight-edges, set squares, protractors, etc.). I'd like to sell my book with a set of these tools. Ordinarily, these construction tools would be considered dull, but the connection with Clifford Algebra might make them invigorating.

Thanks all.

Right now, the idea of going self-employed to become a writer of any type is almost certainly ill-advised. It's relatively likely that you can find a publisher, but the chance of them offering you an advance of more than 4-digits (Euros, Dollars, Pounds, you choose) is low, and royalties are typically non-existent or negligible. If you're lucky you can pitch it as a course text of some sort but I wouldn't be wagering my livelihood on that.

I know someone who is technically a full-time writer - but he's only recently gone full time after having a handful of novels already published. He wouldn't have been able to live off the money from the first few. All the other book writers I know do it in their spare time. Certainly when I was approached to write a book, it was under the clear assumption that I would do it in my evenings and weekends as the publishers knew full well what they were offering can't pay the bills.

Would I, personally, buy your book? No, sorry. It sounds interesting, but I only buy 1 or 2 technical books a year and they are chosen to be specifically relevant to my area of expertise.

1 hour ago, Kylotan said:

Would I, personally, buy your book? No, sorry. It sounds interesting, but I only buy 1 or 2 technical books a year and they are chosen to be specifically relevant to my area of expertise.

Can't agree more.

Technical books are usually expensive since just a few people are interested in reading them. These are usually people who work in this field, people who are dealing with the topic of your book or students who need them to learn for their exams. The latter group mostly buys (if they buy them instead of going to the library) the books of their professors or the ones the professor advised them to read. So your target audience gets even smaller.

2 hours ago, jkabrg said:

I'm thinking of going self-employed. Some people I've spoken to consider this unwise

I consider this as unwise too. The field you chose is probably a niche (just guessing) in a niche market. So you can't expect your book to pay the bills.

Greetings

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royalties are typically non-existent or negligible.

In which case I'll print it, bind it, package it, and post it myself.

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the publishers knew full well what they were offering can't pay the bills

Self-publishing might have given you a better chance of earning a living.

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If you're lucky you can pitch it as a course text of some sort but I wouldn't be wagering my livelihood on that.

It is intended to be a course text.

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Would I, personally, buy your book? No, sorry. It sounds interesting, but I only buy 1 or 2 technical books a year and they are chosen to be specifically relevant to my area of expertise.

Interesting. But most of the 7 billion people in the universe would answer no. I'm more interested in the yeses.

9 hours ago, jkabrg said:

In which case I'll print it, bind it, package it, and post it myself.

9 hours ago, jkabrg said:

Interesting. But most of the 7 billion people in the universe would answer no. I'm more interested in the yeses.

You should listen to what people are telling you. Some of them (not me) have written books and therefore have the experience, which I believe, you was a bit looking for, when starting your topic.

If you see computer graphics best sellers books, which will definitely be sold more than a specific math book, all of their authors have a decent job. None of them made it their only mean to earn money.

You should also be interested not only in the yes (I highly doubt you'll find a lot of interested people here), but to the no too. This will give you an overview of the proportion of game devs who might be interested in your book.

Also, when wanting to read a book, most people first want to know the background of the author. Do you have a PhD ? A master degree ? Did you work in some research centers ? Did you applied your work in successful situations ?

All of this is important, I believe.

23 hours ago, jkabrg said:

In which case I'll print it, bind it, package it, and post it myself.

The reason publisher pay crap royalties is not because they are greedily keeping all of the money to themselves.  Book publishers are actually incredibly generous when compared to game or music publishers.  The reason publishers pay crap royalties is because they themselves barely make enough money to cover costs.

No, I wouldn't buy a book for that, I'd use the internet.