Wanted Ebooks

If you’re interested in producing an ebook for Standard Ebooks, why not work on one of these books?

If something in this list interests you, please contact us at our mailing list for help before you start work.

If you want to suggest a different book to produce, please carefully review the kinds of work we do and don’t accept.

Add a book to this list

Patrons Circle members may submit ebooks for inclusion on this list.

Patrons Circle members periodically vote on a selection from this list to pick one ebook for immediate production. You can join the Patrons Circle to have a voice in the future of the Standard Ebooks catalog.

For your first production

If nothing on the list below interests you, you can pitch us something else you’d like to work on.

First productions should be on the shorter side (less than 100,000 words maximum) and without too many complex formatting issues like illustrations, significant endnotes, letters, poems, etc. Most short plain fiction novels fall in this category.

• Tom Brown’s School Days by Thomas Hughes

• Wieland by Charles Brockden Brown

• Ralestone Luck by Andre Norton

• The Adventures of Sally by P. G. Wodehouse

• The Oakdale Affair (Mucker 3) by Edgar Rice Burroughs

• Tarzan and the Ant Men (Tarzan 10) by Edgar Rice Burroughs

• The Outlaw of Torn by Edgar Rice Burroughs

• The Rivet in Grandfather’s Neck by James Branch Cabell

• The Line of Love by James Branch Cabell

• Robur the Conqueror Robur-le-Conquérant by Jules Verne

• Privy Seal by Ford Madox Ford (Book 2 in the Fifth Queen Trilogy)

• The Fifth Queen Crowned by Ford Madox Ford (Book 3 in the Fifth Queen Trilogy)

• Outdoor Pastimes of an American Hunter by Theodore Roosevelt

• A Book-Lover’s Holidays in the Open by Theodore Roosevelt

• The Purple Land by W. H. Huson

• The Chink in the Armour by Marie Belloc Lowndes

• With Edged Tools by Henry Seton Merriman

• The Black Moth by Georgette Heyer

• The D’Arblay Mystery by R. Austin Freeman

• The Starvel Hollow Tragedy by Freeman Wills Crofts (Inspector French #3)

• Imperium in Imperio by Sutton E. Griggs

• Overshadowed by Sutton E. Griggs

• The House Behind the Cedars by Charles W. Chesnutt

• The Colonel’s Dream by Charles W. Chesnutt

• Shepherds of the Wild by Edison Marshall

• The House at Pooh Corner by A. A. Milne. (Note: remove illustrations)

• The Homemaker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

• The Bridal Wreath by Sigrid Undset

• Jenny by Sigrid Undset

• The Green Hat by Michael Arlen

• The Conscience of a Conservative by Barry Goldwater

Moderate-difficulty productions

• John Brown’s Body by Stephen Vincent Benét

• Malleus Maleficarum by Heinrich Kramer, translated by Montague Summers (page scans)

• The Castle of Wolfenbach by Eliza Parsons

• How to Tell the Birds from the Flowers and Other Woodcuts by Robert Williams Wood

• Animal Analogues by Robert Williams Wood

• Wild Animals I Have Known by Ernest Thompson Seton (Note: PG transcription has removed formatting)

• The Poetic Edda translated by Henry Adams Bellows

• The Curse of Kehama by Robert Southey (Vol. 2)

• Roderick the Last of the Goths by Robert Southey

• On the Nature of the Gods by Cicero (PG link includes this work as part of an omnibus)

• On the Sublime by Longinus

• The Mummy! A Tale of the Twenty-Second Century by Jane C. Loudon (Transcription is of the 1st edition, but we want to update it to the 2nd or later edition)

• Poetry by Thomas Macaulay including Lays of Ancient Rome

• Hamilton by Mary P. Hamlin and George Arliss

• Short fiction by Andre Norton

• William Meister’s Apprenticeship by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Page scans)

• A Voyage to Abyssinia by Jerónimo Lobo

• Short fiction by Vernon Lee (To be compiled in an omnibus “Short Fiction”)

• Short stories and novellas by Sheridan Le Fanu (To be compiled in an omnibus “Short Fiction”)

• Poetry of William McGonagall (To be compiled in an omnibus)

• The Recollections of Alexis de Tocqueville

• The Indiscreet Toys by Denis Diderot

• Maxims by François duc de La Rochefoucauld

• Works and poetry by Walter de la Mare

• Poetry by Edward Thomas

• Novels by W. S. Maugham

• The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi

• Essays and Dialogues by Giacomo Leopardi

• The Fur Country: Seventy Degrees North Latitude Le Pays des fourrures by Jules Verne

• The Perennial Bachelor, by Anne Parrish (Harper Novel Prize winner 1925)

• Lady Rose’s Daughter by Mary Augusta Ward

• Short fiction and short novels of Saki (H. H. Munro); some research may be required to determine whether to produce an omnibus Short Fiction or how to divide up his stories

• Poems by Andrew Marvell to be compiled into an omnibus

• The Life of Jesus Critically Examined by David Strauss

• Epictetus’s “Enchiridion” and fragments as a Short Works compilation, in Thomas Wentworth Higginson’s translation, to supersede our current edition of his short works in George Long’s inferior translation

• A Joy Forever (a.k.a. The Political Economy of Art) by John Ruskin

• The Crown of Wild Olive by John Ruskin

• Munera Pulveris by John Ruskin

• Sesame and Lilies by John Ruskin

• Time and Tide by John Ruskin

• Short stories by Manly Wade Wellman to be compiled into a “Short Fiction” omnibus

• Norwegian Folktales, by Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe, translated by George Dasent (part 1, part 2)

• Geronimo’s Story of His Life by Geronimo

Advanced productions

• The Adventurous Simplicissimus by Hans Jakob Christoph von Grimmelshausen

• Parallel Lives by Plutarch (translated in 1919 by Bernadotte Perin)

• Manhattan Transfer by John Dos Passos

• Thalaba the Destroyer by Robert Southey (transcription required; editions vary widely; research on best edition is required)

• Joan of Arc by Robert Southey (transcription required)

• Madoc by Robert Southey (transcription required)

• Poetry by James McIntyre, “The Cheese Poet” (partial transcription required; more poems found in Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames)

• Wolf Solent by John Cowper Powys (transcription required)

• The Life of William Morris by J. W. Mackail (transcription required)

• An Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke (Volume 2, to be produced as one ebook)

• Utopia by Thomas Moore

• The Ramayana by Valmiki, translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith

• The Mahabharata by Vyasa, translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Vol. 2, Vol. 3, Vol. 4; as a single production; several sections are missing)

• Abie’s Irish Rose by Anne Nichols (transcription required)

• Two Treatises of Government by John Locke (Note: PG only has the 2nd treatise; transcription is required for the 1st treatise)

• The Life of Reason by George Santayana

• Skepticism and Animal Faith by George Santayana. (transcription required)

• When We Were Very Young by A. A. Milne (research needed to see if we need a poetry omnibus)

• The Memoirs of the Conquistadors by Bernal Díaz del Castillo (Volume 2)

• Saïd the Fisherman by Marmaduke Pickthall (transcription required)

• Poetry by Harry Cust (transcription required)

• The Baburnama by Ẓahīr-ud-Dīn Muhammad Bābur

• The Revenger’s Tragedy, by Thomas Middleton. Mistakenly attributed to Cyril Tourneur. (#10 in Greatest Villains)

• The Trickster of Seville and the Stone Guest, by Tirso de Molina. English translations in PD are difficult to find; scans of a 1923 translation are available. (#24 in Greatest Villains)

• The Peasants by Władysław Reymont (transcription required; see Winter, Summer, Spring)

• Short stories by Algernon Blackwood (To be compiled in an omnibus “Short Fiction”)

• The Odes of Horace

• Poems by Trumbull Stickney (transcription required)

• Cyrano de Bergerac, by Edmond Rostand, translated by Brian Hooker. This is a 1923 publication, transcription is required

• The Life of Johnson by James Boswell. George Birkbeck Hill’s unabridged edition was published in six volumes, all of which are on PG; the link leads to the first volume

• The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni; there is a 1924 translation that must be considered, and will require transcription

• Short fiction by Jack London, to be compiled in a “Short Fiction” omnibus. We already have three short story compilations that must be rolled in to this one. See this bibliography spreadsheet.

• Short stories by W. W. Jacobs (We already have Lady of the Barge; do we need an omnibus?)

• Poetry by Mark Akenside (make sure this collection is a complete corpus of his works.)

• The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes by Anonymous

• The Journal of a Disappointed Man by W. N. P. Barbellion

• The Nun Ensign by Catalina de Erauso (transcription required)

• The Complete Essays of Michel de Montaigne

• The Complete Letters to his Son by Philip Dormer Stanhope

• A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume

• Essays of Elia by Charles Lamb

• Creative Evolution by Henri Bergson

• Aesthetical Essays by Friedrich Schiller

• The Analects by Confucius

• The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James

• The World as Will and Idea by Arthur Schopenhauer (Vol. 2, Vol. 3)

• Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville (Volume 2, together as a single ebook)

• The Complete Angler by Izaak Walton (Note: the Wikisource transcription will be easier to work with than the PG transcription.)

• The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

• Short story collections by P. G. Wodehouse (Note that we already have all Jeeves, School, Mulliner, and Ukridge Stories completed. A spreadsheet is available that lists the rest.)

• The Memoirs of Casanova

• Poetry by St. John of the Cross (Transcription required.)

• Poetry by John Clare (Careful research required to deduplicate this large corpus.)

• The Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson, by Thomas Jefferson

• Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais (Confirm this is the Ozell 1737 revision. Should we prefer the Wallis 1897 revision?)

• Poetry by Robert Burns, probably in an omnibus

• Poetry by E. A. Robinson

• Fors Clavigera by John Ruskin (some transcription may be required: as of May 2024, 6 out of 8 volumes are available on PG)

• Sinbad: A Romance by Cyril Kay Scott (Transcription required.)

• Blind Mice by Cyril Kay Scott (Transcription required.)

• The Travels of Marco Polo by Rustichello da Pisa, translated by Henry Yule (volume 1, volume 2)

• Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler by Norbert Jacques (transcription required)

• Dark Princess by W. E. B. Du Bois (PD 1928; transcription required)

• Tarka the Otter by Henry Williamson (transcription required)

• Memoirs of General William T. Sherman by William T. Sherman

Jules Verne

Verne has a complex publication and translation history. Please review these notes before starting any Verne books.

• As of 2024, 20,000 Leagues Under the Seas does not have an acceptable public domain translation, therefore we will not host that ebook.

• Master of the World has two PD translations, one from 1911 and one from 1914. The 1911 version is bad, and the 1914 by Cranstoun Metcalfe version is preferred; but, as of 2023, there are no transcriptions or page scans for the 1914 version.

Uncategorized lists

• Entries in the James Tait Black Memorial Prize list

• English translations from the Prix Goncourt list

• Entries in the Hawthornden Prize list

• Public domain entries in the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library

• Public domain entries in the Guardian’s top 100 novels of all time list

• Public domain entries in Le Mondes’s 100 Books of the Century

• Public domain entries in Pulitzer Prize for Drama

• Public domain entries in Pulitzer Prize for Fiction

• Public domain entries in the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series (Note that not all of these are in the U.S. public domain)

• Public domain entries in this Spreadsheet of plays that have appeared on lists of the “Best Plays of All Time.”

• Entries in the Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction

• The Wilderness Hunter by Theodore Roosevelt (a 2 volume work in which this PG transcription is volume 2; editions vary widely; transcription likely required for volume 1 or the latest possible combined edition)