PhDs by publications are a relatively new model for doctoral research, especially in the context of the Humanities or Education. This paper describes two writers' experiences of conducting doctoral studies in this genre and in these faculties. Each discover alternative ways of employing a body of published research papers in development of an overarching thesis. The writers argue that whilst it can be a pragmatic choice for some, PhDs by publications are more likely to be highly complex meta-narratives and that an overview of past research is fraught with theoretical, conceptual and epistemological challenges in the quest for coherence. They claim that the nomenclature "PhDs "by" publications" or ""through" publications" is misleading: in the epistemological space of Humanities or Education studies, this mode of doctoral research is more accurately represented as a "PhD "with" or "alongside" publications". They conclude that the particular affordance of the model is that it privileges accounts of the process of knowledge building and of descriptions of the gradual emergence of "doctoralness" in the person of the researcher. (Contains 3 notes.)