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In doing the research to determine the pricing for my book,

I found that most trade paperbacks are going for 18-22. Here are some examples:

Two Ocean War by Samuel Elliot Morrison : 24.95
About Face by David Hackworth : 22.00
John Paul Jones by Samuel Ellito Morrison : 21.95
The Battle for the Falklands by Hasintgs and Jenkins : 18.95

Usually you can find these discounted by 15-20% online at Amazon.

Harpdback are going from anywhere between 25 and over 30 dollars these days. Here are a couple of examples:

The Bear and the Dragon by Tom Clancy : 28.95
It Doesn't take a Hero by Norman Schwarzkopf : 29.50
A Most Fortunate Ship by Tyrone Martin : 30.95

My Trade paperback novel, a 450 page tehchno-thriller with 80 illustration is selling now for 19.95. At low volume, and wanting to put it in stores, this is the best I can do and still make any money on the books I whole sale. The printing at the current volume is costing me just over 7.50 per book. Shipping to me in low quantities (50-100) costs around 60 cents per book. My shipping out in minimum groups of twelve to a store costs about 80 cents per book. That's a cost to me (counting nothing for my own time and investment to date) of 8.90 per book. The books stores want a 100% markup to cover their costs and give them a profit. So, 8.90 times two is 17.80 meaning when I sell to book stores I am making about two dollars and 15 cents on each book.

On my site I sell them for the same price (stores will be reluctant to buy from me if I am underselling them) and I make good money on each of those sales, although my costs are higher there because I put the books in individual shipping packaging (around 60 cents per book) and the shipping at individual bulk rates is higher (around 1.75 per book).

If I can get to a point where I am buying thousands of books at a time, I can lower my prices significantly and still make more money. That's one goal.

Of course the dream is for some big publishing house to pick it up and do a mass printing and publication all over the country. In that scenario, the print costs go wat down, but you add several "middlemen" between the author and the buyer. An Agent who wants their cut, a publication house who wants their cut, and then the retailer or maybe even a distributor in front of the retailer. All of them want a piece of the pie. So, even though in mass production the print costs goes way down (maybe around 2 dollars per book), you have a lot of people trying to share the 17.95 that is left over and some of them investing heavily to do so. Usually the author in such a scenario gets very little per book. But you don't need too much per book if it sells hundreds of thousands of copies, or millions.

Hope this helps. This is what I am discovering as I try and publish my own.