One of the hardest matters to be attended when considering publishing a new work is to think about how you want the book to look, and in what format you expect it to look as you envision it. For our new book, which has a fundraiser over at Givesendgo entitled How To Do Battle Well: A Guide to Judeo-Christian Spiritual Warfare, the consideration came down to the ability to output to a pdf first and foremost, and a paperback second.
This, then, became a choice ultimately between Latex, the tried and true, and Typst—the new contender. Distant consideration went to Pandoc and Markdown, and Scribus. One Typst format looked especially promising, but in trying to alter some basic layout of the book code, it was discovered that it did not function as anticipated. Therefore, it makes more sense to go with the ole reliable Latex template which, though often immensely complex, can be boxed into doing one's bidding if one has enough patience and uses the right latex compilation engine.
How To Do Nothing Well: A Guide to Meditating Actively was written in Quarto by the third edition, and used an independent template on the first. Quarto was ideal for outputting to many formats, but lacked some creature comforts such as the ability to output a glossary. (That feature was requested something like three or four years ago, kinda doubt it is coming anytime soon) The Rogue Scholar: the Rogue to Destiny used a Latex template.
A big dimension of consideration was that of time. If a template has basically everything you might use pre-baked into its structure, then that means you are going to have more time to write and spend less time trying to move a letter 1 em over to the right. If you can get eighty percent of what you want, you can leave the remaining twenty and start writing instead. After all, no one reads the book that is not on their screen or in their hands.
Anyway, with the formatting basically settled, and the IDE picked for writing the work, (Texpile a newbie) then the larger task of writing and content can begin to take center stage. If you feel so compelled, a donation helps this process continue to maintain forward momentum. Check out the Givesendgo link, and if the spirit moves you, please donate!