Last Giveaway for July

It's been at the back of my mind that I promised one more giveaway for July. The goal is to give out one of these big softcover "coffee table" editions of 365 Days of Gratitude every month for the foreseeable future. (I picture it here with two other books just so you can see the sheer size of it.)

Then I got all wrapped up in the new Take Me With You release and its incredible numbers (like #3 and #4 in Kindle). And it's a bit of a distraction.

But July isn't over yet. So let's go ahead and do this right now. I'll collect entries for three days or so and then choose a winner at random on the first of August. If you don't win, don't despair. Read my post about the new "No Losers" seven entry rule.

As always, I ask only that you read a few guidelines below so this giveaway goes smoothly: 

Leave a comment below to be entered. Please DO leave your email address in the comment form. I promise I won't use it for any other purpose but to notify you if you win. Please DON'T leave your email address in the body of your comment unless you want everybody to see it. And remember the "author" in the comment form is the author of the comment, not the book. In other words, you. In each of these giveaways one or more people comment as "Catherine Ryan Hyde" because they see "author" and think it means me. Please use your own name, otherwise I can't enter you, because I'll have no idea who you are!

***One very important addition: If you're reading this blog on Goodreads, please click through to the original post on my website and leave your comment there. Otherwise I'm afraid I'll forget the Goodreads people one of these times when I go to draw names***

Good luck!

Update on Friday, August 1, 2014 at 9:03AM by Catherine

The winner of this coffee table book for July is Tarah. But if you didn't win, don't despair. I'll give away another in August. Plus there's the new seven-entry "No Losers" rule. Read about it here if you're not familiar.

Pay It Forward Book for Children

This is a giveaway. But I'd like to do it a little differently.

While I was away on vacation, Simon & Schuster sent me a big handful of advance reader's copies of the new Pay It Forward: Young Readers' Edition.

It's scheduled to release on August 19th. It's the same book, edited by me, just pared down to a solid G rating. And it's suitable for kids as young as eight.

I want to give some of the ARCs away.

But rather than draw names out of a hat, I'd like it if you'd tell me why you want one, and one you'd do with it if you had it. You see, this book is for kids, and the people who read and follow this blog are adult readers. With any other of my books, the answer to that question would be you'd want it to own and read. But all who are reading this post would be better suited to the adult edition. The idea of this edition is to get the Pay It Forward idea into the hands and hearts of kids, kids who weren't even born when the book and the movie first came out.

So what would you do with one of these? Are you a teacher? Do you have kids of your own whose lives you shape every day? Do you have other ideas for how to get this book into the hands of kids?

Just let me know in the comment section. I'm not deciding yet how many of these I'll give away. I'm going to wait and see the responses and then decide. I probably don't have one for everyone, but let's try it and see what happens. And if you don't win one, read my post entitled "No Losers." This giveaway counts toward that magic number seven.

As always, please read some basic instructions for entering:

Leave a comment below to be entered. Please DO leave your email address in the comment form. I promise I won't use it for any other purpose but to notify you if you win. Please DON'T leave your email address in the body of your comment unless you want everybody to see it. And remember the "author" in the comment form is the author of the comment, not the book. In other words, you. In each of these giveaways one or more people comment as "Catherine Ryan Hyde" because they see "author" and think it means me. Please use your own name, otherwise I can't enter you, because I have no idea who you are!

***One very important addition: If you're reading this blog on Goodreads, please click through to the original post on my website and leave your comment there. Otherwise I'm afraid I'll forget the Goodreads people one of these times when I go to draw names***

I'll run this for about a week. Good luck!

Update on Friday, July 18, 2014 at 1:30PM by Catherine

Okay, folks. It's been a week, so I'm closing this to comments now. In the next day or two I'll choose ten people to receive ARCs. The rest of you... if you'll be patient, I'll send you a finished copy when I get my finished copies from the publisher next month. If they don't send me enough author's copies, I'll order more. I just feel like the quality of answers and the level of commitment to the PIF ideal be in the "no losers" category. I'll email you all for mailing addresses.

Update on Friday, July 18, 2014 at 1:41PM by Catherine

All right. Here are the ten people I chose to receive advance readers' copies. I went heavy on the teachers because school will start for many around the time this book is released. I thought the timing would be more important in their cases. The rest of you, if you will be patient, I will offer you a free copy when the finished books are available to me.

The ten: Mrs. D, Amy Behlke, Isabella, Michelle Cherney, Judythe Guarnera, Jody Grove, Joan Dooley, Theresa Comilla, Julie, and Kathy Cauffman.

But I will email you all to request mailing addresses.

Update on Friday, July 18, 2014 at 2:04PM by Catherine

Jody Grove, your spam filter marked my email to you as spam and refused to deliver it. If you see this, please add me to your safe sender list and contact me, either by comment or by my email address on the "contact me" page. If you don't see this, I don't see what I can do. Sorry.

Update on Friday, August 1, 2014 at 4:44PM by Catherine

A small announcement: I sent out 23 emails offering a finished book. I have the books now, and I'm preparing a mailing... but I've only heard back from 16 of you. I know it's easy to get swept up in a spam filter, but I don't know how to remedy that. In case any of you come back to the blog to see who got the books, please contact me. If you left a comment on this blog before I closed out the contest, I'm ready to send you something. But I need your address.

No Losers

I've been doing giveaways on my blog for years. Pretty regularly. Right now I'm giving away six of the ten Take Me With You audiobooks the publisher sent me. I enjoy it. I don't mind the postage costs (it's a tax-deductible promotional expense, after all). And I know avid readers struggle with book budgets. And I like rewarding the readers who are so faithful to me and my books.

There's just one thing I don't like about it.

Every time I pick winners, a few of my wonderful fans who did not win leave comments, here or on Facebook, that quietly say something like, "Congratulations to the winners." You can hear the sigh. Some are more directly honest and say, "I never win." Or just sigh.

I don't want readers signing up for giveaways over and over and over and coming away feeling like they never win. That it's always somebody else's name coming out of the hat.

So I've come up with an idea. I sat on it a while. And the more I sit with it, the more I like it.

If you enter seven giveaways and don't win a book, just point out to me the seven you entered. And I'll send you a book. For the dedication of that continued effort. For being someone who's so closely involved with my blog and my books. You can even pick which book you want me to send. Just don't pick an audiobook, please, because I don't keep extras of those lying around the house.

This can be retroactive, too. Think you've already entered seven giveaways? Look back and see which ones they were and then email me. (Hint: There's a blog index in the right-hand sidebar of the blog page. All the giveaways are under "Announcements.") Count them up and only get five or six? Well, I have a giveaway going on now and at least one more for the month of July. Won't take you long to get there.

No more sighs. More reading, less sighing. 

July: The Giveaway Month

As some of you may know, I was just away on vacation. While I was gone, quite a few fun things turned up on my doorstep.

First of all, I got my author copies of the brand new Take Me With You, due out from Lake Union/Amazon Publishing on July 22nd. In the box were both MP3 and CD audiobooks. Five of each. And as you know if you follow this blog, I archive two of each. Send me five and I give three away.

I also got advance readers' copies of the new Young Readers' Edition of Pay It Forward, due out August 19th. So that will be the next giveaway.

And of course I have to give away another 365 Days of Gratitude photo "coffee table" book in July.

I thought about doing it all at once, but it made me tired to think about it. Too many ways that could get complicated. So I'm going to start with these six audiobooks.

As always, I ask only that you read the following to know how to enter:

All you need to do is leave a comment to be entered. Please DO leave your email address in the comment form. I promise I won't use it for any other purpose but to notify you if you win. Please DON'T leave your email address in the body of your comment unless you want everybody to see it. And remember the "author" in the comment form is the author of the comment, not the book. In other words, you. In each of these giveaways one or more people comment as "Catherine Ryan Hyde" because they see "author" and think it means me. Please use your own name, otherwise I can't enter you, because I have no idea who you are!

***One very important addition: If you're reading this blog on Goodreads, please click through to the original post on my website and leave your comment there. Otherwise I'm afraid I'll forget the Goodreads people one of these times when I go to draw names***

And if you have a preference between CD and MP3, please state it clearly in your comment.

I'll run this giveaway for about a week and then move on to the next. Good luck!

Update on Thursday, July 10, 2014 at 5:17PM by Catherine

This giveaway is officially closed. The winners are Mimi, Viv C., Laura Ruthemeyer, Roxana, Pat Wieczorek, and Carole Lewis. If you didn't win, check out my blog post "No Losers." And start counting! 

The ARCs Keep Coming!

Most of you know I have another brand-new novel releasing in December. Yesterday, just a week or two after receiving the advance reader's copies of Take Me With You, my July release, the UPS guy brought me these.

Must. Give. Away.

Now. There's just one catch. I'm going off on a two-week trip in the new camper van (photos to follow). So I won't be around for this giveaway. Which doesn't really matter when you think about it. It just means I won't answer your comments with my own. You just have to trust that when I get home in the first week of July, I'll have them all in one place and draw names.

I'll give away four of these. As always, I ask only that you read the few simple directions below:

All you need to do is leave a comment to be entered. Please DO leave your email address in the comment form. I promise I won't use it for any other purpose but to notify you if you win. Please DON'T leave your email address in the body of your comment unless you want everybody to see it. And remember the "author" in the comment form is the author of the comment, not the book. In other words, you. In each of these giveaways one or more people comment as "Catherine Ryan Hyde" because they see "author" and think it means me. Please use your own name, otherwise I can't enter you, because I have no idea who you are!

After the 4th of July holiday, I'll draw four names.

Good luck!

Update on Thursday, July 3, 2014 at 10:29AM by Catherine

I came back to this blog post this morning to see how many of these I promised to give away. Much to my surprise, it seems I didn't state a number. So I choose five. Will draw names shortly after giving people one last chance to enter. 

Update on Thursday, July 3, 2014 at 10:31AM by Catherine

Ooops. I didn't read down far enough. I said I'd give away four. But now I'm giving away five, aren't I?

Update on Thursday, July 3, 2014 at 2:23PM by Catherine

Aaaaand... the winners are... Misty Miller, Tory Young, Cindy H., Carole Bishop, Estelle.

If you didn't win, have no fear. This is going to be a very big month for giveaways. I have a lot of stuff I'm about to post, including six audiobooks of Take Me With You and arcs of the new Pay It Forward Young Readers' Edition! And of course another 365 photo book for July. You'll always have more chances!

You Really Can Buy the 365 Book in Paper

I made this change fairly quietly, but a lot of people are asking me about it, so I'm going to make a bit more noise. Yes, 365 Days of Gratitude: Photos from a Beautiful World is available as a big, full-color coffee table book. If I may be allowed to say so, it really turned out well. (This is more praise for the print-on-demand printing process than for myself.) If you look for it on Amazon, you won't find it. You'll only find the $3.99 Kindle. But it's available to buy. You just have to have the link.

I've placed the link on the right-hand sidebar of its book page on this site, where it will live forever. But of course I'll offer it in this blog as well. It's HERE.

As you can imagine, the book is not cheap. Because the production costs on 365 large full-color photos is huge. The book is for sale for $35 on CreateSpace, and believe me, there's not much in the way of profit there. It's basically production cost, plus CreateSpace's cut, plus pennies left over in royalties. It's a rounding-up to a nice round number from the very lowest price I could put on it. It would have been nice to sell it on Amazon. A lot more people would find it. But then I would have had to price it at $45 across the board.

Now for the good news: I honestly believe that when you receive your copy you will not feel overcharged. It really is a $35 book. It's 8 1/2 by 11, huge and heavy. Not hardcover, but still a genuine coffee table book. If I'm wrong, and you disagree, I'll happily buy it back from you.

The other good news is that there are cheaper ways to enjoy the book. The Kindle edition is only $3.99. And I'll be giving away a copy a month on this blog for the foreseeable future. I have a giveaway going right now, in fact.

I think you'll find it's a nice gift idea. I'm having a lot of fun giving them as gifts.

Feedback welcomed.