> But as a single person, I can only take on a project this big with AI as a tool.

That's so not true though. One of my uncles did work like this and it usually took a year or two to fully research a project and write a book but it is definitely doable to do this sort of thing - and much better, frankly - as a single individual. AI makes it a matter of days, but it also makes it next to worthless.

The biggest contribution here is to make an otherwise lesser known book more known.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%B6ffelholz-Codex

(Couldn't find an English wikipedia page on it)