Thanks to everyone who voted and commented last month on the cover for our forthcoming book, Eat Local for Less (if you missed it, you can see the choices and comments here). While each cover had its partisans, there was a clear preference for the first option, and the second option (featuring a young woman taken from a World War II-era Victory Garden poster) had significantly more negative reactions. So, we’re going with option one.

There was also some feedback about the readability of the subtitle and other details, and we‘ve also taken that into account and tweaked the design accordingly (and reserve the right to tweak it more in the future). You can see the final cover design here.

And congratulations to commenter Barbara Davidson, who won a free copy of the book (when it eventually comes out) in our random drawing!

We’re going back into our caves now to keep working on the book and get it ready for publication. Watch this space for announcements on when it will be available for preorder. And if you can’t wait, you can shop our current nature and environmental library right now!

We need your help choosing a cover for our next Ruka Press book. The book is now called Eat Local for Less, and it’s in the later stages of editing. We’ve narrowed down the cover choices to two, but we need your help choosing the final cover.

Eat Local for Less by Julie Castillo is a guide to choosing delicious, healthy, environmentally friendly, affordable food for your family. The antidote to overpriced, boutique “natural” foods on the one hand and unhealthy processed food products on the other, this book is a guide to transforming your relationship with food from routine to blissful. It shows readers how to buy local, organic, and sustainably grown food for less than they pay at the supermarket. It’s not written to persuade but to inform, with the goal of helping people act on the choice they’ve already made to eat purposefully and buy responsibly.

The two covers are below. Please cast your vote and leave any constructive criticisms in the comments. (Legal disclaimer: results of vote are nonbinding.) To sweeten the deal, we’ll send a free book to a randomly selected commenter. We’ll let you know who won, and when the book is available, in a future edition of our newsletter (and on Twitter, Facebook…). Thanks!

Option 1

Option 2

We are proud to announce that author Julie Castillo has signed a contract with Ruka Press to publish her first book, tentatively titled Opting Out of Industrial Food: Feed Your Family and Your Worldview for Less than You Pay at the Supermarket. Publication is initially planned for late in 2014.

Opting Out is a guide to choosing delicious, healthy, environmentally friendly, affordable food for your family. The antidote to overpriced, boutique “natural” foods on the one hand and unhealthy processed food products on the other, this book is a guide to transforming your relationship with food from routine to blissful. It shows readers how to buy local, organic, and sustainably grown food for less than they pay at the supermarket. It’s not written to persuade but to inform, with the goal of helping people act on the choice they’ve already made to eat purposefully and buy responsibly.

“I heard dozens of voices, on TV, radio, and the Internet, grumbling that local organic food was much more expensive, and not one voice suggesting that it could be cheaper,” Castillo said. “I decided to be that one voice.”
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getAbstract is a service that recommends and summarizes the latest business books for a large, international audience of business executives. getAbstract decided to make The Pipeline and the Paradigm one of three “Editors’ Picks,” bringing it to the attention of even more of their readers. We are grateful for the endorsement.

They wrote: “While always remaining politically neutral, getAbstract recommends this heartfelt side of the debate to those concerned about energy and climate change and to anyone who wants to learn more about the extraction of oil from tar sands and Keystone itself.”

Our authors have several events planned in September and October. Come out and say hello.

Samuel Avery, author of The Pipeline and the Paradigm:

• September 17, 6:00 pm—Green Institute, 732 East Market St., Louisville, KY
• September 19, 7:00 pm—Meadowlark Coffee House, 1624 South St., Lincoln, NE
• September 26, 5:00 pm—The Faculty House, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY
• November 4, 1:25 pm—Jefferson County Technical College, Louisville, KY
• October 10—Elizabethtown Community and Technical College, Elizabethtown, KY

Katie Fallon, author of Reed Writing Award finalist Cerulean Blues:

• October 14, 7:00 pm—Augusta Bird Club, Staunton, VA

Joan Maloof, author of Among the Ancients:

• September 25, 2:00 pm—Dedication of Rockefeller Forest, Humboldt County, CA.
• October 11, 6:30 pm—Recreational Tree Climbers International, Georgia.