Books about ABBA and related subjects

My first ABBA book was published in 1994 – since then there have been many other titles, as well as revised editions of earlier books. To complicate matters further, some of my books have been issued in many different languages and with different covers. Even I am sometimes confused by the different titles, so this page attempts to explain how the various books differ from each other – or, as may be the case, are connected to each other.

ABBA – THE COMPLETE RECORDING SESSIONS (1994)
This chronicle of ABBA's recorded output was my first ABBA book. Two years later, I took some of the material in this volume and incorporated into the Swedish-language book ABBA – Människorna och musiken (1996), adding well-known biographical material to make up a kind of music-focused biography. ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions itself was finally revised and updated in a vastly superior and expanded edition in 2017.

ABBA – MÄNNISKORNA OCH MUSIKEN (1996)
A Swedish-language book that married together the music-focused research from ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions with biographical material about ABBA, to make up a slim, music-slanted biography. This book was also published in Russian in 2001 as ABBA – Ljodi i mozika.

FRÅN ABBA TILL MAMMA MIA! (1999)
I wrote the text for this book consisting of photographer Anders Hanser's pictures of ABBA and the individual members. In 2000 the book was published in English as From ABBA To Mamma Mia!, followed by a Japanese edition in 2002. An updated edition of the English version was published in 2010.

BRIGHT LIGHTS DARK SHADOWS – THE REAL STORY OF ABBA (2001)
This was the first-ever full-scale biography of ABBA. After its hardcover publication in 2001, there were a number of paperback editions, all of which were slightly revised and updated – and there was also an audio book in 2011. A thorough revision was conducted for its 2014 paperback edition. It was again revised in 2024, at which time the title of the book was changed to Bright Lights Dark Shadows – The Definitive Biography Of ABBA. There is a detailed page about the history of the book on this website.

Bright Lights Dark Shadows was published in German as Licht und Schatten: ABBA – Die wahre Geschichte in 2003. A revised and updated German edition was published in 2011. As far as I'm aware, the German version has not been revised or updated since then.

There was also a Russian edition of the book: Bright Lights Dark Shadows: ABBA – Podlinnaya Istoriya, published in 2003. This version of the book was reprinted, with maybe a few updates (I was not involved) in 2009 under the new title Jarky svet, Chorny teni; Podlinniya Istoriya gruppy ABBA.

ABBA – THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO THEIR MUSIC (2005)
Omnibus Press, the publisher of Bright Lights Dark Shadows – The Real Story Of ABBA, commissioned me to write this paperback discography of the group's output, as part of a series of discographies devoted to different artists. A German version entitled ABBA – Story und Songs kompakt was published in 2007. An updated edition was published in 2009 (without my knowledge or involvement, as far as I can recall).

ABBA – THE STORY (2008)
I wrote this Swedish-language biography out of frustration that no publisher in my and ABBA's home-country of Sweden were willing to publish Bright Lights Dark Shadows. But although the ABBA story is what it is, this book is not identical to Bright Lights Dark Shadows; I wrote a completely new book. My agent at the time did a fabulous job in getting this published in several languages:
ABBA – Historien om supergruppen (2008; Danish)
ABBA – Verdens største popeventyr (2008; Norwegian)
ABBA (2009; Finnish)
ABBA – Příběh superskupiny (2009; Czech)
ABBA – A legenda (2013; Hungarian)
ABBA – Historia supergrupy (2013; Polish)
ABBA – A biografia (2014; Brazilian Portuguese)

ABBA – THE BACKSTAGE STORIES (2014)
Co-written with Ingmarie Halling, ABBA's Make-up and Wardrobe Supervisor during their tours in 1977, 1979 and 1980 – and, today, curator at Stockholm's ABBA The Museum – this was more Ingmarie's book than mine. I was brought in because the publisher felt that maybe Ingmarie's memories of being on tour with ABBA wouldn't quite be enough for a book. I'm not sure they were right about that, but I was glad to make a contribution.

The story of this book's publication in the English language and its different titles is incredibly complicated and confusing, so brace yourselves:
ABBA – The Backstage Stories: The Swedish publisher printed Swedish- and English-language versions of the book with identical covers and titles.
ABBA – The Treasures: UK publisher Carlton retitled the book and published it with a different cover.
ABBA – The Backstage Story: Carlton also published the book under the almost-the-same-as-the-original-title through their Sevenoaks imprint, and with yet another cover. This was only available through the UK chain The Works.

There were also editions in the following languages; like the Swedish and English editions, they were all published in 2014:
ABBA – backstage-historierne (Danish)
ABBA Backstage (German)
ABBA backstage: historiene, bildene, minnene (Norwegian)
ABBA (Italy)

ABBA – THE COMPLETE RECORDING SESSIONS – REVISED AND EXPANDED EDITION (2017)
This much-improved edition of my first ABBA book, originally published in 1994, was self-published in 2017. A massive amount of new information was added to this new edition, which won the Association for Recorded Sound Collections 2018 award for Best Popular Music Discography.

ABBA AT 50 (2022)
A picture-heavy story of ABBA, commissioned by Palazzo Editions (now a part of Gemini Books) and published to celebrate the 50th anniversary of ABBA's formation and the group's first single, People Need Love. Even if I say so myself, I feel this book is the ideal entry-level biography of the group for those who want a factually accurate and compelling overview of their story, but maybe aren't yet up to getting to grips with a massive biography such as Bright Lights Dark Shadows.

There were editions of this book published in a number of other languages:
ABBA: Thank You For The Music (German)
ABBA: L'album des 50 ans (French)
ABBA (Hungarian)
ABBA: Historia kultowego zespołu (Polish)

ABBA ON RECORD – PACKAGED PROMOTED REVIEWED (2024)
This self-published book started out as a companion volume to the revised edition of ABBA – The Complete Recording Sessions, but grew into something much bigger. It's basically a discography, but with a massive amount of background information on the making of the album sleeves, the promotion of ABBA's music, how it was reviewed, and much more. There are also two additional chapters about the making of the Voyage album and the contents of the Michael B. Tretow Tapes.