Publisher Profile: Skyhook Press
The CBC asks Aaron Shepard, Founder & Publisher, questions about the publisher.
How did your publishing house start out?
Our overall operation, with the horrendous name Shepard Publications, was one of the pioneers of what is now called “POD publishing”—using print-on-demand for frontlist as well as backlist titles. We were having great luck with adult nonfiction by my wife, Anne L. Watson, and me, including what for years was the most popular children’s writing guide on Amazon.
At the same time, the picture books I had once sold to big publishers were, one by one, going out of print. It was heartbreaking, but I decided I could now do something about it.
So, we obtained rights and reissued The Legend of Lightning Larry, a cowboy tall tale that was the most popular book of my school visits. That was followed by others, including The Baker’s Dozen: A Saint Nicholas Tale, which has become our top-selling book for any age, year after year. (With its new cover, it has done much better for us than it ever did for Atheneum!) Then, there was The Sea King’s Daughter: A Russian Legend, featured in the 1997 New York Times Ten Best Illustrated Books of the Year, with art from renowned Russian illustrator Gennady Spirin.
Where in the country is your house based?
Since starting our publishing house, we’ve lived in several places in California and Washington State, and we currently live in Bellingham, Washington. But publishing “apartment” might be a better moniker than publishing “house”!
Luckily, with POD publishing, we are not anchored in place by a huge stock of books. In fact, we have no inventory at all! We never even see most orders, and the few that come to us directly are forwarded to a printer for drop shipping.
How many employees does your house have?
Employees? What are those? Aside from contracted illustrators and translators, it’s just Anne and I.
Which genres does your house prefer to publish?
As a children’s author, I mostly retold world folktales, and Skyhook Press has retained that focus. But we’ve also tried our hand at original stories by Anne and me, including several illustrated by Wendy Edelson, Atheneum’s illustrator for The Baker’s Dozen.
One of those originals is a historical picture book called Christmas Truce, based on a famous incident of World War I. It has been another one of our top sellers and was even featured in a British TV special by the royal family, broadcasted live from Westminster Abbey!
Which formats does your house prefer to publish?
Skyhook publishes in paperback, hardcover, and e-book. And we hope to soon add audiobooks and maybe video.
What are some of your house’s publishing priorities over the next few years?
We just signed with Epic, the subscription reading app for schools and families, so we’ll be learning how best to work with them and possibly with other reading apps. We’re also trying to broaden our international reach, with sales to foreign retailers and translations. Finally, we’ll be submitting to more awards, hoping to get our books more attention.
Which title has your house recently rallied behind?
In 2025, we published a 25th Anniversary Edition of The Crystal Heart: A Vietnamese Legend. The first edition from Atheneum was very well reviewed and picked up a couple of awards. We’re hoping it will do well again, especially with the growth of the Vietnamese-American community.
It’s a gorgeous book, illustrated by the amazing artist Joseph Daniel Fiedler in his picture book debut, and the story is one of the most moving you’ll ever find in a folktale.
Which title does your house feel deserved more love than it got?
A few years back, Anne wrote a prequel to The Night Before Christmas, which we dubbed The Mice Before Christmas. It reveals just why the mice weren’t “stirring” by the time Santa Claus arrived. (Basically, they were all tuckered out from their own party!)
It’s written in the same rhyming style as the earlier poem, but it’s even more fun. And Wendy Edelson illustrated it with some of her best work yet. Oh, that two-page cross-section of the four-story Victorian mouse house!
Frankly, it’s the most crowd-pleasing book I’ve ever been involved with—including many of the ones I’ve sold to big publishers. It got close to fifty glowing reviews on NetGalley, which repeatedly called it a “new classic.”
Unfortunately, Anne and I have never fully transitioned to the age of social media, so our marketing was not up to the huge potential of this book. I’m still pushing it, but it really needs a larger publisher, and I hope someday to find one for it.
Which of your frontlist titles would be great for a school or public library, classroom, and bookstores?
Almost all our retold folktales are aimed at schools and libraries. As for bookstores…
An unfortunate reality of POD publishing is that color printing is very costly—especially when you feature the kind of quality art we often do. So, we are simply not able to offer discounts that would let physical bookstores stock our books from Ingram, but they do get a standard discount on bulk orders directly from our website.
What else would you like to tell us about your house and the amazing work you do?
Folktale retellings not only provide windows into other cultures, but they also reveal universal values. Retellings of this kind, often graced with exceptional art, are no longer favored as they once were. But many kids, teachers, and librarians still love them—so we aim to keep them coming.
Thank you, Skyhook Press!
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