Gastel & Day: How to Write & Publish a Scientific Paper, ninth edition

Writing a scientific paper for the BAA Journal or any other publication can seem daunting, especially for first-time authors. I previously found a 1980s edition of this book very helpful, and I am pleased to report that this ninth edition is equally so.

The book comprises 42 short chapters across eight parts. Part I addresses some preliminaries, including defining what a scientific paper is and providing some historical perspectives. We learn that scientific journals first appeared in 1665, with the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London and France’s Journal des Sçavans. Today, over 48,000 peer-reviewed journals publish more than four million articles annually (2021 figures).

Part II, ‘Preparing the Text’, is probably the most useful section for new authors. It discusses the essential components of writing a paper, from the importance of selecting an appropriate title (its structure and even its length) to preparing the abstract, which for me is always the most intimidating part. It then goes through a paper’s main constituents, such as the Introduction, Materials & Methods, Results, and Discussion.

The chapter on references is particularly helpful; I know this is an area that causes our own Journal editors a great deal of work as errors in this section (and not just in the Journal!) are notoriously common. Ultimately, responsibility lies with the authors to check references and ensure their citation format is correct (guidance on formatting references for the Journal is available at tinyurl.com/yrdm9fze). Furthermore, the book highlights W. C. Roberts’ assertion: ‘Manuscripts containing innumerable references are more likely a sign of insecurity than a mark of scholarship’.

The next two parts address preparing tables and figures (Part III) and the publishing process (Part IV), including peer review, proofs and copyright – particularly when it comes to obtaining permission to use other people’s illustrations. The peer-review process, often referred to as refereeing, is of course the cornerstone of scientific publication, yet can seem daunting to new authors. Indeed, it took me a while to realise that the comments from referees were made in a constructive manner to help me produce a better manuscript.

Later sections provide guidance on other types of publication (Part V), such as writing a review paper, letters to the editor, book reviews (I hastily re-read the salient paragraphs before penning this review!) and conference communications (Part VI), including poster publications and conference reports.

Part VII covers scientific style and has constructive advice on avoiding jargon. Appendix 2 on ‘words and expressions to avoid’ is also helpful in this regard, listing dozens of jargon phrases and how to replace them. For example, ‘in order to’ can usually be replaced simply by ‘to’. Finally, Part VIII covers other communication topics such as writing a thesis, preparing a curriculum vitae, and how to provide a peer review.

The style throughout is engaging, with helpful illustrations and amusing cartoons. The advice is consistently down-to-earth, with perhaps the most important point being: ‘Remember, you are writing to communicate, not to impress. Readers of scientific papers want to know what you did, what you found, and what it means; they are not seeking great literary merit’.

I thoroughly recommend this book to anyone preparing a scientific paper. Experienced authors might also find it useful, as it covers some of the latest publication trends. These include the use of digital object identifiers (DOIs) to provide persistent links to cited publications. Each Journal paper now has its own DOI, and authors should include the DOIs of papers that they cite. Another trend is the growth of open access publishing, whereby papers are made freely available online immediately upon publication. The Journal has recently become open access (see p. 296).

Jeremy Shears has been Papers Secretary since 2014. Having written (probably too) many papers for the Journal, he is only too conscious of having committed many of the more egregious errors outlined in this book, for which he apologises to editors and referees past and present. He looks forward to new authors contributing papers to the Journal.