FREE/BARGAIN - Non-Fiction - 2015

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

How do "self publishers" and "vanity publishers" differ?

Vanity publishers do the work for you - for a fee.

[GtrsRGr8]

One criticism: the authors and/or publisher of this book need to get a better graphic artist/designer to do their book covers.

APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur-How to Publish a Book. By Guy Kawasaki; Shawn Welch. Rated 4 1/2 stars, from 947 reviews at the present moment. Print list price $24.99; digital list price $9.99; Kindle price now $0.99. Nononina Press. 410 pages. http://www.amazon.com/APE-Author-Pub...Publish+a+Book.

Book Description
This version of APE was updated with the most recent content, facts, figures, tools, and resources on March 5th, 2013. This is version 1.2 (Baldacci).

In 2011 the publisher of one of my books, Enchantment, could not fill an order for 500 ebook copies of the book. Because of this experience, I self-published my next book, What the Plus!, and learned first-hand that self-publishing is a complex, confusing, and idiosyncratic process. As Steve Jobs said, "There must be a better way."

With Shawn Welch, a tech wizard, I wrote APE to help people take control of their writing careers. APE's thesis is powerful yet simple: filling the roles of Author, Publisher and Entrepreneur yields results that rival traditional publishing. We call this "artisanal publishing"--that is, when writers who love their craft control the publishing process and produce high-quality books.

APE is 300 pages of step-by-step, tactical advice and practical inspiration. If you want a hype-filled, get-rich-quick book, you should look elsewhere. On the other hand, if you want a comprehensive and realistic guide to self-publishing, APE is the answer.

[GtrsRGr8]

Deleted. Posted on the wrong thread. Arghhh!

[GtrsRGr8]

There are many books on this subject "out there" (especially dealing with the prisoners and murder victims who were Jewish (the Holocaust), though this book has a broader scope). This one has very high ratings, a large size, and a very compelling price.

The Journey Back From Hell: Conversations with Concentration Camp Survivors. By Anton Gill. Rated 5 stars, but from only 1 review at Amazon; rated a 4.18/5.00 at Goodreads, from 28 reviews (which is very high for GoodReads). Kindle price now $3.99; I'm unable to locate other pricing information. Endeavor Press, publisher. 559 pages. http://www.amazon.com/Journey-Back-H...back+from+hell.

Book Description
All these years on, how do the survivors of the most horrific episode in world history regard their wartime experiences, and how have they come to terms with their memories?

How did their experience of the Nazi concentration camps change them emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, and politically?

And what are their feelings about their former tormentors today?

In talking to some 120 survivors in 14 different countries — including political prisoners and resistance fighters — Anton Gill has produced a masterpiece of oral history that is both an account of the survivors’ lives after liberation and a testament to their courage.

First published in 1988, each experience of the ‘journey back from hell’ is unique, and readers are free to draw their own conclusions from what the survivors tell them.

But the combined effect of the stories is so poignant and important to the core experience of the 20th century that nobody can afford to turn away — or to forget.

[Little.Egret]

Queen Victoria and the Bonapartes by Theo Aronson

"What do you say to the wonderful proceedings in Paris, which really seem like a story in a book or a play?" wrote Queen Victoria to her uncle, King Leopold of the Belgians, in December 1851. Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, nephew of the great Napoleon Bonaparte, had made himself dictator of France, stealing the limelight of the European stage to open the first act of a play that would last for more than thirty years-and in which Queen Victoria was herself to play a major role. Into the Queen's staid, predictable and circumscribed life, the Second Empire Bonapartes brought a breath of another world. Adventurers, parvenus, exotics, they radiated an aura of romanticism to which Victoria's ardent nature was quick to respond.

But in the second act came disenchantment: Napoleon's Italian war disgusted his former ally, and its end brought little improvement in the relations between the two countries. The Queen and her ministers suspected that Napoleon's former intention of avenging Waterloo had only lain dormant, and not died away. The Franco-Prussian war, however, brought a dramatic turn of fortune's wheel: in six short weeks the Empire had fallen and Napoleon had surrendered at the battle of Sedan.

In the long twilight of the tragedy, the friendship between Victoria and Eugenie developed until the Empress became almost an honorary member of the British Royal Family. The Queen's unwavering championship of the dethroned, exiled and bereaved Eugenie revealed her at her most admirable: compassionate, practical, loyal, and stubborn in her determination to put persons before politics. Eugenie herself lived to see the defeat at Sedan avenged by the Allied victory of 1918;


Theo Aronson is the author of over twenty works of royal historical biography including Grandmama of Europe, The King in Love, Napoleon and Josephine and a biography of Princess Margaret.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00S0RVM1G/

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00S0RVM1G/
http://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00S0RVM1G/

[Little.Egret]

James Plumptre's Britain: The journals of a tourist in the 1790s by James Plumptre (Author), Ian Ousby (Editor), John Julius Norwich (Preface)

`I am ashamed to think how much I travelled and to how little advantage to myself and others,' James Plumptre wrote in 1811, by then a middle-aged clergyman weighed down by the responsibilities of his rural parish, looking back on his record as a tourist in the 1790s.

This characteristically modest, self-doubting judgement is hardly fair on the youthful energy that had made him use every moment he could spare to set off, travelling on foot whenever possible but still managing to explore most corners of mainland Britain. And it slights the journals he kept, full of youthful enthusiasm for the simple life of the open road and the scenery of north Wales or the Lake District, packed with curiosity about ironworks and coalmines, country houses and antiquities, celebrities of the day and chance acquaintances made in local inns, where Plumptre often needed all his natural resilience in coping with the discomforts and accidents to which he was prone.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00TXQQAK6/

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00TXQQAK6/
http://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00TXQQAK6/

[GtrsRGr8]

All of us in the United States, at least, have heard of John Muir. Of course we have. We may have suspected that he lived a fascinating life (which he did), too, but didn't know the facts. Well, this biography can change that.

This book is also billed as a "biography of Alaska," seemingly because of the book's detailing of the time that Muir spent in Alaska and, especially, his fascination with the glaciers of Alaska. (My advice: if you have an opportunity to visit Alaska, but are pressed for time or money, you can skip the interior parts of Alaska that most packaged tours would show you (there is almost nothing all that special to see, imho). But, be sure to take a cruise of the Inside Passage--the views are truly stunning.)

This book is marked down at the present moment to $1.99, from a digital list price of $24.99--92%!

John Muir and the Ice That Started a Fire: How a Visionary and the Glaciers of Alaska Changed America. By Kim Heacox. Rated 4 1/2 stars, from 17 reviews at the present moment. Print list price $25.95; digital list price $24.99; Kindle price now $1.99. Lyons Press, publisher. 264 pages. http://www.amazon.com/John-Muir-That...hanged+America.

Book Description
A dual biography of two of the most compelling elements in the narrative of wild America, John Muir and Alaska.

John Muir was a fascinating man who was many things: inventor, scientist, revolutionary, druid (a modern day Celtic priest), husband, son, father and friend, and a shining son of the Scottish Enlightenment -- both in temperament and intellect. Kim Heacox, author of The Only Kayak, bring us a story that evolves as Muir’s life did, from one of outdoor adventure into one of ecological guardianship---Muir went from impassioned author to leading activist. The book is not just an engaging and dramatic profile of Muir, but an expose on glaciers, and their importance in the world today. Muir shows us how one person changed America, helped it embrace its wilderness, and in turn, gave us a better world.

December 2014 will mark the 100th anniversary of Muir’s death. Muir died of a broken heart, some say, when Congress voted to approve the building of Hetch Hetchy Dam in Yosemite National Park. Perhaps in the greatest piece of environmental symbolism in the U.S. in a long time, on the California ballot this November is a measure to dismantle the Hetch Hetchy Dam.

Muir’s legacy is that he reordered our priorities and contributed to a new scientific revolution that was picked up a generation later by Aldo Leopold and Rachel Carson, and is championed today by influential writers like E.O. Wilson and Jared Diamond. Heacox will take us into how Muir changed our world, advanced the science of glaciology and popularized geology. How he got people out there. How he gave America a new vision of Alaska, and of itself.

[Little.Egret]

Little Egret says:

Charles River Editors

Black Hawk Down: The History of the Battle of Mogadishu

American Legends: The Life of Henry Kissinger


see all

http://www.amazon.com/s/?url=search-...=charles+river

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?url=searc...=charles+river
http://www.amazon.ca/s/?url=search-a...=charles+river

[Little.Egret]

Chinese Education in Singapore: An untold story of conflict and change by Zhixiong Zhang

Singapore had a literacy rate of only thirty-seven percent in 1947, but it is famously one of Asia's most educated nations today. Its achievements in education are internationally recognized, and according to the 2008 IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook, it had the best education system out of fifty-five countries.

What about its past?
"Chinese Education in Singapore: An untold story of conflict and change" is a newly published book that takes the reader on a journey through Singapore's educational past.

Readers on Goodreads have expressed great enthusiasm:
"...rated 5 of 5 stars.

A very awesome book cover, great maps, illustrations, font & writing style. A very well written historical Asian culture book. It was very easy for me to read/follow from start/finish & never a dull moment ... Lots of exciting scenarios, with several twists/turns & a great set of unique characters to keep track of.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/...#other_reviews

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00V45H05I/

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00V45H05I/
http://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00V45H05I/

[ATDrake]

If you happen to garden/farm and/or have an interest in nature appreciation/exploration, there are a whole bunch of sale titles from Algonquin Books and Storey Publishing @ $1.99-$2.99 each, and some from Open Road Media at the $2.99 and up mark, including some pieces by the late environmentalist Rachel Carson (Wikipedia), which are all couponable @ Kobo and likely price-matched in the standard Canada & US stores.

Algonquin Books has about a page-and-a-half of $1.99 non-fiction sale titles (mixed in with some of their literary fiction) including:

• Flower Confidential: The Good The Bad And The Beautiful by Amy Stewart (Wikipedia), a behind-the-scenes new-technology-exploring look at the commercial flower industry to cultivate bigger, brighter, and better-selling blooms
• The Birds of Pandemonium by Michele Raffin (Wikipedia), a book about the efforts to conserve endangered birds at her non-profit bird sanctuary and various heartwarming encounters with the birds living there
• and a few discovering-joy-through-returning-to-the-land sorts of memoirs and other titles: linkage for the rest of them @ Kobo

Storey Publishing, a specialty DIY imprint, has 13 titles, mostly @ $2.99 about backyard gardening & homesteading, picking the best tomatoes and what to do with them, horse-training, and crafts like crochet: linkage for the lot @ Kobo

There are also additional couponable titles @ Kobo's Long Weekend sale, where you'll find the Open Road sale books, as well as many more (including a bunch of hockey and Canadian history/wilderness titles @ $3.99-$4.99): Save up to 70% of Non-Fiction! [sic]

[ATDrake]

Free from the author via KDP Select @ Amazon: (linkage for the lot)

Against Her Will: The Senseless Murder of Kelly Ann Tinyes by Ronald J. Watkins (Wikipedia), a true crime account originally published by Kensington's Pinnacle imprint in 1995 and reprinted straight up until 2011.

Richard and Victoria Tinyes feared the worst when their thirteen year old daughter Kelly Ann vanished from their quiet suburban community of Valley Stream, New York, on March 3, 1999. But the nightmare to come was worse than they could ever imagine. Only five doors away, in the home of John and Elizabeth Golub, police found Kelly Ann's body stuffed in a plastic garbage bag. She'd been brutally beaten, stabbed, strangled, and mutilated. After weeks of intense investigation, police arrested the Golubs twenty-one-year-old son, Robert - a reclusive young man obsessed with bodybuilding and given to fits of rage. The sensational trial and subsequent conviction of Robert Golub shocked the nation and tore the once peaceful community apart. Neighbors took sides. So did the media. And no one who lived on Horton Road would ever be the same.

Unknown Seas: The Portuguese Captains and the Passage to India, a repeat of his nautical trade history, originally out from John Murray in 2003, which won some sort of maritime writing prize, IIRC.

In the fifteenth century, the world beyond Europe began to emerge from myth and legend, and it was the Portuguese who led the way. They founded an empire that stretched from China to Brazil, and the peak of their achievement was Vasco da Gama's discovery of a sea route to India. Still today, landmarks, coastlines and currents around the world bear Portuguese names, and the oceans of the world are one vast watery grave for Portuguese seamen. For those who sailed beyond the known world life was harsh beyond measure. Yet the discoverers were not lured only by gold, precious stones and spices -- they were driven to colonise, to enslave, to bring their religion to the unconverted. Reconstructing journeys from contemporary logs and papers, this absorbing and wonderfully vivid account brings to life the captains driving their small ships, the ordinary seamen and the far-off, not always friendly traders they met.

Evil Intentions: How an Act of Kindness Led to Senseless Murder, a repeat of his true crime account originally out from HarperCollins' William Morrow imprint in 1992.

On January 29, 1981 young Suzanne Rossetti locked herself out of her car in Phoenix on the way to meeting her parents. Two drifters offered to help her out. One was an escaped convict, the other had just been released from prison. Within minutes they had abducted Suzanne who they then subjected to a night of rape and terror before brutally murdering her in Arizona's Superstition Mountains. This is an account of murder, told from all sides, such as you've never read before.

Watkins also offers some self-published mystery/thriller tales, if you're interested.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

. . . .

Evil Intentions: How an Act of Kindness Led to Senseless Murder, a repeat of his true crime account originally out from HarperCollins' William Morrow imprint in 1992.

. . . .

The Whispersync audio companion to this is only $1.99. With the ebook being just short of 300 pages, this makes for a lot of listening for just a little bit of money.

The Audible audio has a regular price of $17.95, so it is over the threshold ($14.95) for the current Buy 4, Get $10 (credit) Audible promotion going on right now. That means that the Whispersync audio companion to this book will count as one of the four audiobooks needed to snag the $10 credit.

[GtrsRGr8]

The Deal
You can get two free ebooks related to wilderness survival and such things from a company called Ancient Pathways, LLC. Ancient Pathways is an outfit offering "outdoor programs in desert survival and bushcraft."

The titles are Map and Compass Skills and Wilderness Tips and Tools. Both of them are by a fellow by the name of "Tony Nester." I downloaded both books, and skimmed one of them. The one book is loaded with photos (I like photos. ); they are of inconsistent quality, but many of them are very good. I know nothing else about these books, nor the author, but that may be because I'm not "into" the survival book genre (although I really did like Les Stroud's TV show, Survivor Man I think that it was called, and Bear Grylls' TV show (maybe it is/was the one called Survivor Man, I don't remember now). I didn't care much for Dual Survivor, though).

You may be suspecting what I'm going to say next. Okay, I'll go ahead and say it--the books are only available in pdf.

The "hoop" that you have to jump through is not very bad. Just subscribe to their newsletter, and whammo bammo, your web browser sends you to a page with links to both of the books.

Oh, I need to give you the link to the page on Ancient Pathways' website, don't I? ha.

My Sermon
Please allow me to give you, here, something of a homily. The main point is this: yes, I could give you the direct links to these books, but I won't. Allow me to tell you why I won't.

The folks that give away free books don't just do it from the goodness of their hearts (although certainly that is often part of it). They are hoping to generate interest in their businesses and be able to make a profit so that they can continue to stay in business, and maybe even grow it some to serve more people. If people go to direct links, the businessmen and businesswomen don't get the full results that they intended when they expended all of the time and effort (and maybe expense) of making the books free to you. See?

If you don't care about ethical reasons, then do it for purely selfish reasons. Yep, that's what I said. Here's what I mean. The more that people bypass the intents of the people who make these ebooks available for free, the less that they are going to be willing to give away ebooks, and the less ebooks that we will be able to get for free.

So, I will respect their desires, and not give you the direct links page. If someone else chooses to do it, I'll consider that his or her own business.

End of sermon. Now feel free to go get lost somewhere deep in the wilderness. I know that you will be able to make it okay. Make sure that you read these books first. Who knows, maybe you'll get your own TV show out of it.

[GtrsRGr8]

But I didn't choose to post this book on the basis of its markdown--it's not marked down as much as those that I like to post (a minimum of 85% or so)--but because the subject of the book is so out of the ordinary from all of the ebooks that I run across. I was intrigued. Maybe you will be, too.

How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare. By Ken Ludwig. Rated 4 1/2 stars, from 98 reviews at the present moment Print list price $14.00; digital list(?) price $7.99; Kindle price now $1.99. Crown, publisher. 368 pages. http://www.amazon.com/How-Teach-Your...en+Shakespeare.

Book Description
A foolproof, enormously fun method of teaching your children the classic works of William Shakespeare

To know some Shakespeare provides a head start in life. His plays are among the great bedrocks of Western civilization and contain the finest writing of the past 450 years. Many of the best novels, plays, poems, and films in the English language produced since Shakespeare’s death in 1616—from Pride and Prejudice to The Godfather—are heavily influenced by Shakespeare’s stories, characters, language, and themes. In How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare, acclaimed playwright Ken Ludwig provides the tools you need to inspire an understanding, and a love, of Shakespeare’s works in your children, and to have fun together along the way.

Ken Ludwig devised his friendly, easy-to-master methods while teaching his own children. Beginning with memorizing short passages from the plays, his technique then instills children with cultural references they will utilize for years to come. Ludwig’s approach includes understanding of the time period and implications of Shakespeare’s diction as well as the invaluable lessons behind his words and stories. Colorfully incorporating the history of Shakespearean theater and society, How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare guides readers on an informed and adventurous journey through the world in which the Bard wrote.

This book’s simple process allows anyone to impart to children the wisdom of plays like A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Twelfth Night, Macbeth, and Romeo and Juliet. And there’s fun to be had throughout. Shakespeare novices and experts and readers of all ages will each find something delightfully irresistible in How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare.

[Froide]

Draining Dixon: How Rita Crundwell Embezzled More Than $50 Million from Her Illinois Town
Chicago Tribune (Author)

Book Description
Publication Date: June 18, 2013

Comprising articles from the Chicago Tribune's in-depth coverage of the Rita Crundwell scandal, Draining Dixon is the true-life account of the Dixon, Illinois, comptroller who embezzled over $50 million from municipal coffers during a twenty-year career in local government. From 1983 to April 2012, Crundwell kept an eye over virtually every dollar that passed through the small town of Dixon's accounts, while also running one of the most successful horse farms in America. When the story broke that this municipal employee was the subject of an investigation, almost no one was aware of the entire shocking truth.

This book follows the chronological history of Rita Crundwell's career as the Dixon, Illinois, comptroller, while also exploring her personal life as one of the best-known Quarter Horse breeders in the country. Crundwell's horses won 52 world championships and she was named the leading owner by the American Quarter Horse Association for eight consecutive years prior to her arrest. This story is one of the most bizarre and surprising tales of white-collar crime and governmental corruption in United States history, and now readers can read the entire story exactly as it unfolded.

• Amazon.com
• BN.com