APS BOOKS/APS PUBLICATIONS

Xmas selling with Aberford Authors – L-R Bill Hern, Sara Godden, Andrew Sparke, Chris Berry

Five years in preparation – inspired by frustration – visiting an amazing concentration camp museum near Gdansk only to find virtually nothing in print in English about the place. An initial booklet led to lengthy research and eventually this full history of the camp, its creators, its inmates, its guards… Writing it also made me realise how little of what we think we know about the purpose and use of concentration camps (all 1200 of them in existence until 1945) is fact – what we know about is Auschwitz-Birkenau (a place unique in scale and purpose both as a death and labour camp). Stutthof was very different in so many ways. Its a grim history but one full of tales of survival and humanity too.

Two small boys are playing wargames as boys have done since time immemorial. They run towards the camera clutching guns made of wood, their knees grubby beneath the type of clothing in which small boys across Europe were commonly dressed for most of the twentieth century when out of school – shorts and hand-knitted, woollen jumpers. Nothing unusual about that…except that these boys are the two eldest sons of Max Pauly and the backdrop to their game is the Stutthof Concentration Camp where their father is Kommandant. What price innocence now?

I seldom recommend specific services to authors but Bryan Cohen has to be an exception. When we had major Amazon KDP problems it was he who helped sort it with Amazon. Anyway his Best Page Forward teaches ads, writes blurbs, and does a whole lot more that’s completely invaluable. Find out how they can help you using this Facebook link: 
https://www.facebook.com/bestpageforward

Format is a recommended author who chooses and reviews 5 books on a chosen subject. My subject is 5 Books To Make You Love Istanbul – visit https://shepherd.com/best-books/to-make-you-love-istanbul

Constantly amazed that having completed the hard graft of writing a book, many authors don’t research indie publishing and end up paying large sums to predatory companies whose main income comes from authors rather than readers. So my response to a Facebook request for information on using Author House (or any other such company) is reproduced below:

First rule is don’t use predatory publishers whose business is making money out of authors rather than readers. Explore and understand indie publishing online with KDP. If you then feel learning publishing skills is too much find a publishing co-operative like us which doesn’t charge you, understanding that marketing your book will be a shared responsibility.

This approach should mean as a writer you don’t shell out money unnecessarily, you have a realistic view of likely sales, and you get a good quality book out reasonably edited and with a good cover, and available at a sensible price people might be prepared to pay  (paperback £5-£9 eBook £1-£3). Job done and nobody feeling scammed.

So, author warning! Talk to New Street Authors or the Alliance of Independent Authors or someone like us (andrewsparkeauthor@gmail.com). Whatever you do avoid like the plague all the companies listed below which only exist to make money out of authors: AuthorHouse,  Novum, United p.c., Austin McCauley, Tate, XLibris, America Star Books, Author Solutions, Archway Publishing, Westbow, Balboa Press, Delle Arte Press, Abbott Press, Lulu, Choir Press and many many more  you’ll find listed under Self Publishing on every search engine going.

For more on this subject find this page online – Second paragraph has a link in green font labelled DATABASE