So two questions:
What are some general book building guidelines? (I'm guessing there are some posts about this but I'm not sure where)
and
How do you connect with players in your area?
When it comes to building books my advice would be to try and come up with an overall gameplan on how you're supposed to beat your opponent. Also some sort of counter vs other types of decks: Aggro - Greed - Mass Creatures - Buddy builds - Beefy mage.
Try and think of how you can get answers to these different playstyles within your main school and try and go as little as possible outside your own school if it's not for something of great importance. Think of weaknesses with your deck and how you can work around it in different scenarios.
Another tip would be to look at a bunch of games on
Arcane Duels youtube channel, here you can see a ton of games from different players and get an overlook on what people like to play and how they deal with different situations.