PublishYourSefer.com

I would like to draw your attention to Mississippi Fred MacDowell’s thorough review of PublishYourSefer.com (which recently lowered its prices) in conjunction with HebrewBooks.org.  (Note:  A sefer [plural: seforim] is a Jewish religious book, usually in Hebrew.)

MFM republished פני תבל and received his hard copy (including shipping time) in a week.  The price of the 292 page book was $8.99 for a paperback and $16.99 for a hard cover.

MFM had previously reviewed the Espresso Book Machine [EBM] service in conjunction with Google Books.

His summary:

[Both the hardcover and paperback] books printed very nicely. The only difference was that the hardcover printed on a very white paper which was a little less nice than the softcover, which printed on a more cream colored paper that was pleasing to my eyes. Paper stock was fine in both cases. Both bindings were excellent – in fact superior to the EBM product (which is certainly very adequate)….

So what’s the bottom line? There’s nothing to complain about. It’s possible that EBM’s prices are a bit better. If that’s the case, then if you see a volume of the Aruch Hashalem that you want to print, by all means go through Google. But for tens of thousand of seforim which are on HebrewBooks.org but not Google Books – there is every reason to feel confident about using PublishYourSefer.com reprints (via Lulu.com ). It would be too much flattery to give it more than the 8 out of 10, which is what I rated EBM, but I’m almost tempted to give it a 9 simply because of how impressive it is that a small business with much creativity and technical prowess can produce a result as good as a much-hyped invention partnered with a corporate entity