Wild Running is Live!

I’m happy to share some big (for me) news!

Wild Running: Lessons from Dogs, Wolves, and the Natural World is now available on Amazon.

Years of thought, research, and writing have finally come together in a book.

These past couple of months, the final sprint to the finish/publishing line, often felt more like a slog as I had to make certain decisions, try to implement them, and deal with Amazon’s publishing arm (KDP).

Ultimately, I decided to offer readers three versions of Wild Running:

E-book – with roughly 20 color photos sprinkled throughout;

Standard paperback – with almost all of the same photos, in the same locations, but in black & white;

Special Edition paperback – with over 50 color photos, collected together in the middle of the book.

But it didn’t start out that way.

Initially, I thought just the e-book would include photos. That was a late idea, but after positive feedback from several beta readers, I went with it. Besides, in an e-book, color photos look great and don’t add any extra cost to production.

I assumed the paperback wouldn’t have any photos because it’s printed in black & white.

But then I wondered, what if I offered color photos in the paperback? How much extra would that cost?

First, though, I priced a hardback version with color photos. I quickly nixed that idea when I learned the minimum list price would have to be $43.00!

But a paperback with color photos wasn’t super expensive to produce. And including a few pages with extra photos added only a few cents to printing costs, so I thought, why not make it worth the extra retail price for color by adding photos not offered in the e-book?

And once I made that decision, I felt bad about offering a standard black & white paperback without photos. I decided to offer the same 20-ish photos as the e-book but in black & white (with the exception of three that I didn’t think would translate well into black & white). When I got the proof of the standard paperback, I was happy with how the photos looked in black & white.

Now every reader would get photos.

On the advice of my cover designer/interior formatter, I decided to offer the color paperback as a “Special Edition.” Its cover has a red circle saying “Special Edition” to distinguish it from the cheaper, black & white paperback.

When that proof arrived, I was pleased with how the color photos looked.

All good! I was ready to go live.

Except Amazon gave me fits recognizing the Special Edition paperback as distinct from the standard paperback. And trying to get all three versions to show up on the same page on their site? So far, a bust. Amazon is used to a title having three formats: e-book, paperback, and hardback. They link all three together so shoppers can easily move among them before choosing. They don’t seem to know what to do with my “Special Edition” paperback version. It’s not a hardback, plus it’s not identical to the e-book or standard paperbacks (because of the extra photos). So far, they’re only linking the e-book and standard paperback together. The Special Edition paperback shows up separately.

Frustrating. Confusing.

Sorry.

I share all this so (a) if you’re an author about to publish you don’t encounter the same hurdle, and (b) if you visit Amazon to check out Wild Running (and I hope you will), you’re aware that you may need to search for “Wild Running Special Edition” to get that version to show up in search results. (As a favor to me, if you visit any or all versions, feel free to click several times so that they’ll rank high in search results.)

Amazon’s way of handling this is less than optimal because it will split reviews to two different pages. I’m hoping to get the issue fixed soon. If not, I may remove the standard paperback for now and just offer the Special Edition paperback.

Whew.

Okay, now that all that TMI is out of the way, I hope you’ll take a peek at Wild Running (e-book and standard paperback here, Special Edition paperback here) and consider reading it. If you do (and you don’t hate it), I’d love to know your thoughts. My big ask is that you consider leaving a review on its Amazon page, whether a starred review or a few sentences about what you liked. Thanks.

I have created a Facebook page for Wild Running where I plan to share “on this day” photos of the dogs, wildlife, and scenes depicted in much of the book. I hope it will become a fun place to engage with readers, as has been the case with the Facebook page for my first book, Growing Up Boeing. You can also find me on Instagram @rebeccawallick.

With Wild Running fledged, off on a life of its own, I can now return to more regular blogging on random topics. Up next? My thoughts about the recent total solar eclipse that I got to see right from my front yard in Vermont.