You love travel—planning it, doing it and reading or talking about it when you’re not doing it. 

Maybe you even have so many insights to share from your experiences that you’ve thought about writing a travel book. Great idea, but where would you start? 

Excellent question—and one I personally pondered before taking the plunge. Our family published our first set of travel books—Rocket Around Washington DC neurodiverse friendly visual guide and activity books—in 2023, our second set—Rocket Around Switzerland guide and activity books—in 2024, and we’re working on another dozen that we plan to publish in the coming years. 

Getting our books out there has been a wild ride and one where rejection and determination have been our constant companions. Here’s what I’ve learned that may be helpful to you too:

One: Consider how your great idea is differentiated from all the other great ideas out there, then confirm your thinking, and plan against it.

With more than 70,000 travel books available on Amazon, distinguishing yourself is important. I worked with an individual who used to work at major publishing houses to think through our differentiation, then researched books that were like our idea, and further considered how to separate ourselves from the crowd. Ultimately, since we’re a neurodiverse family, we decided to create a series of kids’ travel and adventure books that would be good for all kids ages 5-11, but were specially designed for neurodiverse kids and we contribute to the neurodiversity community through the sale of each book. Our business plan, at the recommendation of our publishing-staffer-turned-consultant, included Mission/Vision, Objectives, Differentiation, Target Audiences and Interests, Brand Extensions, Sponsorship and Partner Opportunities, and an appendix of Research Findings.

Two: Build, then write.

Unless you’re a celebrity with millions of social media fans, think about building a community of followers—a blog, Facebook group or followers through other channels—first, then write your book and launch it to your network. If you want to secure a publisher, bringing them a community will be key, and if you’re not able to secure a publisher right away, but still want to sell your book, your network will be even more important.

Three: YOU can publish your book even without a publisher.

We are proof of this—I researched and reached out to publishers for about 18 months and tried to learn something from each rejection—before deciding to embark on the self-publishing journey. When you self-publish, you can wholly publish your book, or take the ‘hybrid’ route, in which you pay a company to edit, design and upload your book to online bookstores for you. After thoroughly researching each option, we decided since our vision was to do a series of travel books, paying someone else to do it for us without any assurance they would have success selling our books was a luxury we could not afford. We utilize the behemoth self-publishing platform IngramSpark, which allows us to barely receive money through each sale. However, there are other options, including, of course, Amazon Direct.

Four: “Writing” a book often also entails many things that have nothing to do with writing.

Think about the elements of book publishing that come after writing: Designing; building the community of readers and/or purchasers who may have a logical interest in your book; promoting your book on and offline through media, social channels, sponsorships and events; business considerations, such as taxes, book-keeping, copyrights and IBSN codes; networking through Facebook and LinkedIn groups for writers; and your targeting readers and travel writer organizations to solicit ideas from others who have had success.

Five: Know the multitude of distribution channels available to you.

There are more than 1,800 booksellers online and more than 43,000 brick-and-mortar stores across the United States. We’ve learned that, unless you’re carried by a publisher, many bookstores won’t carry your book. Anyone can sell through major online bookstores, and even if independent bookstores consign your book, bookstores may never be much of a money maker for you. But unless your book is priced both competitively and high enough, you could go underwater because of them. Local events are also a great way to interact with potential buyers.

I don’t mean to dissuade you from your dream of writing a travel book—I have loved the experience and plan to write many more. My advice here is meant to help you make your dream a reality.