David B. Williams—Wild in Seattle: Stories at the Crossroads of People and Nature

Advance copy: Backstories on books by NASW members

Wild in Seattle

WILD IN SEATTLE:
STORIES AT THE CROSSROADS
OF PEOPLE AND NATURE
David B. Williams, Illustrations by Elizabeth Person
Mountaineers Books, April 1, 2025
Paperback: $22.95, Audio Book: $18.99-$21.99
Paperback ISBN-13: 9781680517651
eBook ASIN: B0DW4KFJ6F
Audio Retail Download ISBN: 9798331946340
Audio Library Download ISBN: 9798331946357

Williams reports:

My book grew out of Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind, a Substack newsletter I started writing in January 2021. Initially, I sent the newsletter to a mailing list of about 900 names I had gathered. My plan was to share ideas, stories, and observations based on my research and ramblings in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest.

In the first year, I wrote about trees that had sprouted in a downtown excavation; shipworms; hair ice; George McClellan in the PNW; and fruit trees along a Rails-to-Trails path. Subsequent years have been just as eclectic.

Portrait photo of David B. Williams in an outdoor setting

David B. Williams
Photo by Marjorie Kittle

My goal was to be entertaining, educational, and inspiring. One aspect of my newsletter that I like is that I don’t have an editor and my writing can be serious, silly, and somewhere in between. To my pleasant surprise, readers liked my essays, and the subscriber base has grown steadily to a little over 3,700.

About two years into writing the Street Smart Naturalist, I had a conversation with my friend Emily White, the Acquisition Editor at Mountaineers Books. We were working together on a book about the human and natural history of the Cascade Mountains, which will be out in 2026. I knew she subscribed to my newsletter and casually asked if she might be interested in publishing a collection of the essays. About five months later, Emily wrote back to say that she was interested in publishing the essays, that she had thought about how to organize the book, and that she had an artist in mind to create images for it.

We continued to discuss the book, and I continued to publish my weekly newsletter, and I signed a contract in late 2023. After choosing the newsletters, I worked with an editor to reduce redundancy, fix the grammatical errors, eliminate the worst of my bad jokes, and make the newsletters feel less timed to a specific date.

The newsletter format is a great way to see what interests readers, develop a community, and have fun. The out-of-pocket cost is nothing and the rewards are wonderful.

Contact Info:

David B. Williams: 206-707-3551, wingate@seanet.com, https://geologywriter.com/,
Street Smart Naturalist
Instagram @streetsmartnaturalist
Book: Wild in Seattle: Stories at the Crossroads of People and Nature
Publicist: Marissa Litak, 206-521-6065, marissal@mountaineersbooks.com

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Banner image adapted from original photo by David B. Williams.

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Advance Copy

The path from idea to book may take myriad routes. The Advance Copy column, started in 2000 by NASW volunteer book editor Lynne Lamberg, features NASW authors telling the stories behind their books. Authors are asked to report how they got their idea, honed it into a proposal, found an agent and a publisher, funded and conducted their research, and organized their writing process. They also are asked to share what they wish they’d known when they started or would do differently next time, and what advice they can offer aspiring authors. Lamberg edits the authors’ answers to produce the Advance Copy reports.

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