BIW, the Bath Iron Works of Bath, Maine, on the Kennebec River, is one of six remaining US shipyards, and the lead designer and builder of Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyers for the US Navy. The book follows the construction, launching and outfitting of the DDG-75 _Donald Cook_ (the yard's Hull 463), and the training of its first crew. It's not particularly technical, but does have plenty of photos and diagrams.
The DDG-51 Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided missile destroyer is the most recent and heavily-armed design in the US fleet. Class members are 504 feet long, 67 feet wide, and 168 feet to the top of the radar mast; at 9000 tons, they draw 30 feet of water. Four 25,000-hp gas turbines drive two variable-pitch props for a cruising speed of 16 knots, and a max sustainable of 31; flank speed is classified. Primary armament is 90 vertical launch missile tubes in two banks; plus Harpoon missile canisters, two deck-mounted three-tube torpedo launchers, a five-inch forward deck gun and two Phalanx CIWS.
Surprisingly, the ship is essentially handmade -- even if some of the tools are 300-ton presses and plasma torches capable of cutting two-inch steel plate. There's even a blacksmith onsite, who hot-forges small pieces in shapes impossible to create with cold-forming. True, you don't automate unless your output is large and repeatable; ironically, that's what the blacksmith does: ladder brackets and hatch dogging cams. Actually, you'd think hatches would be standardized across all USN ships and available in bulk.
To stay competitive, BIW continually adopts new methods and technologies. Their current methodology involves the largest possible prefab units, built indoors under controlled conditions. The 70-some "assembly units" (as big as the doors and cranes allow) are joined into 40-some "erection units," typically three decks high and the full width of the ship. These are joined into a full ship on the ways, the sloped ramp leading into the river. Building on the ways is three times as expensive as indoors, largely because all the tools must be specially adjusted to account for the incline; but it's still cheaper than outfitting on the water.
There's the comparison with the greater, faster output of European and Japanese commercial shipbuilders. A military vessel is more expensive because it simply packs more stuff, with tighter specs and higher performance, into the same volume.
There's the complex launching procedure, in which the seaworthy hull slides down the waxed-and-greased launching ways into the river. The critical moment comes when the stern becomes buoyant, causing the ship to pivot amidships and compress a special cradle at the bow. This method is soon to be replaced by a submersible drydock.
The book spends almost as much time profiling the yard's ceremonies and workers as its techniques: steelworkers, shipfitters, supervisors and managers. There's also the months-long familiarization of the _Donald Cook's_ first crew, as they work along with the yard to complete outfitting the ship. This understanding, and the consequential skill at damage control, is a particular specialty of the US Navy (the book notes); Japanese commanders during WWII were repeatedly-and-upleasantly surprised to see ships they had thought out of action come steaming back over the horizon.
(The eponymous starship of the 1970s anime "Space Battleship Yamato" might have borrowed its name from a WWII Japanese vessel, but its crew displayed the repair prowess of the USN.)
See also the Yard's website, www.biw.com, and www.hazegray.org for links to other US and worldwide shipyards.