Uncategorized – Page 8

Free Vacation Reading with Kindle Unlimited

Posted on July 24, 2014 by CJ Verburg

Hot vacation tip: sign up for a month’s free trial of Kindle Unlimited before you travel. Amazon’s new subscription service lets you load up your e- or audio-device for the beach, airplane, or campsite with unlimited books — including Boom-Books! Been wanting to read CJ Verburg’s “Croaked: an Edgar Rowdey Mystery” or listen to Charisse Howard’s “Lady Annabelle’s Abduction”? Now it’s easy and free.

Just make sure to read at least 10% of each book you download. Unless an author is published by a big commercial house, that’s the requirement for them to get paid.

When you return home, $10 a month will keep your Kindle, Galaxy, or iPad full of virtual adventures. Or switch to Amazon Prime, if you’d rather read just one free book a month but have your other Amazon orders shipped for free; or try a different subscription service with Scribd or Oyster.

And don’t forget your local library, the ultimate source of free books!

Pros & Cons of Kindle Unlimited vs Scribd, Oyster, Prime, or Playing the Field

Posted on July 19, 2014September 16, 2014 by CJ Verburg

So Amazon’s launched another invasion of the literary world. Kindle Unlimited, its new subscription service, allows members to “buy” as many of the alleged 600,000 e-books for sale on Amazon as they wish, all for a monthly fee of $10. Also included: more than 2,000 audiobooks.

“Buy” means that the books you acquire stay on your e-device for as long as you keep subscribing. Discontinue KU and your shelves go empty. That’s to stop readers from signing up for a month (or a month’s free trial), loading their Kindle or iPhone with thousands of titles, and jumping ship.

How does KU compare with existing subscription services Scribd and Oyster?

More books. KU offers 600K, Oyster 500K, Scribd 400K.
Audiobooks. KU has them, Oyster and Scribd don’t. In this respect, KU’s chief competitor would appear to be Audible, also an Amazon company, which offers a $14.95 monthly subscription.
Different selection. The Big 5 traditional publishers (Random House-Penguin et al.) have opted into Oyster and Scribd but out of KU. Indie/self-published e-books on Smashwords are available on Oyster and Scribd; for KU to include an indie e-book, it must be enrolled in KDP Select, i.e., available only on Amazon. (It may be sold elsewhere in print and other forms.)
Sampling. You can read an excerpt before buying on KU or Scribd, but not Oyster.
Price? $8.99 for Scribd, $9.95 for Oyster, $9.99 for KU. [Updated 9/15/14]
Flexibility? All three services let you read on whatever device you like.
Quality? Oyster and Scribd both get some books direct from the publishers; others come from Smashwords, which processes self- and indie-publishers’ Word or EPUB files through its own “meatgrinder.” The result on the e-page depends on the compatibility of the original file with the processing system(s) as well as the user’s e-reader. A few early e-books on Scribd were badly distorted (they’ve made progress on this, but see the cover L); harder to check on Oyster, with no sampling before you buy. KU’s e-books are the same ones it’s already selling on Amazon, which means they’ve had to pass Kindle’s quality-control check as well as its customers’ scrutiny.

So who’s likely to get the most out of Kindle Unlimited? Well, any of these subscription services is a good deal for readers who spend more than $10 a month on e-books. After that it’s a matter of preference. If you read mostly New York Times best-sellers, which are mostly published by the Big 5, you won’t find them on KU. If you prefer how-to books or genre fiction–romance, mysteries, thrillers–KU’s pool is wide and deep enough to feed the largest appetite. After all, Amazon does (like it or not) sell more e-books than anybody. So the vast majority of non-Big 5 e-books, from Avon romances to Mysterious Press crime fiction to The Hunger Games and Life of Pi, can be read or listened to for free by KU subscribers. For occasional readers, the combination of easy online ordering and free shipping, plus one free book a month, may make Amazon Prime a better choice.

Who else benefits from Kindle Unlimited? Independent authors might. Normally non-famous writers form the bottom of the food chain. Right now, in this highly competitive start-up phase, KU is (however grudgingly) subsidizing authors–who are, after all, where books come from. Will this new Amazon spinoff pull the same kind of bait-and-switch as ACX/Audible, which took a huge bite out of its authors’ royalties a few months ago? Maybe. For now, though, writers willing to swallow the exclusivity clause are cautiously hopeful.

Media reports tend to compare book subscription services to Netflix. Another way to look at this phenomenon is as a throwback. Before public libraries existed, lucky readers could pay a fee to borrow books from a private library. Possibly, as present-day public libraries get up to speed with e-book and audiobook lending (as some are doing), they could pose the stiffest competition for Scribd, Oyster, and Kindle Unlimited.

Ear Holiday! Four Audio Treats

Posted on July 10, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by CJ Verburg

Summer! Whether you’re in the car, at the mall, or on the beach, an absorbing CD or audiobook can screen out boredom and crank up the fun. Here are two exciting music albums, one multimedia Irish memoir, and one short spicy Regency romance to sweeten your commute, work, or vacation.

FactFlavoredFiction(s) by L.A. virtuoso rock/pop/R&B composer & guitarist Ira Ingber
“[A] masterfully written, crafted and recorded effort from Ira and friends….Our praises start with the writing — Ira has painted a picture here with his words. Close your eyes and you can practically see the story unfold, as if in a movie.” — Recording magazine, cut #7, “French Kissing on the Staten Island Ferry”

Listen to samples or buy the album on CDBaby, iTunes

A Thousand Ways Down by Nicole Noel & Chance Meyer
“We wanted to draw lines through time, between our lives and a bygone musical era, by finding their common themes and making music at the intersections…. While our music might tend to drift down through some of the broken places in the world, we hope it ultimately lands you somewhere joyful.” With a background from jazz to pop to gospel, Nic and Chance have created a wonderful multi-traditional synthesis.

Listen or buy on CDBaby, iTunes, Amazon

Longing for Elsewhere: My Irish Voyage Through Hunger, History and High Times by Renee Gibbons
“Born in a Dublin tenement in the middle of the 20th Century, this dead-poor, curious Irish girl escaped to Paris when she was 17 with the help of a nun, a Hollywood actor, and a kind stranger. … On a ship bound for Egypt with her year-old daughter Aisling she fell in love with a radical longshoreman from San Francisco.” A rollicking memoir punctuated with traditional songs.

Listen (or read) on Audible or Amazon – or see Facebook

Lady Annabelle’s Abduction (Regency Rakes & Rebels, I) by Charisse Howard, narrated by Stevie Zimmerman
In one week, Lady Annabelle Chatfield will marry to save her desperate family. But oh, if her reckless brother Stephen had to die in debt, couldn’t he have picked a younger, handsomer creditor than the Earl of Brackenbury? Then a ruthless stranger climbs into her chamber at midnight, launching a passionate adventure which will turn Lady Annabelle from a girl into a woman. 5 stars!

Listen for $6.95 (or read for 99¢) – Audible, Amazon, iTunes

The Regency Era in America, or Happy Independence Day!

Posted on July 4, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by Charisse Howard

Hard to believe it’s been well over 200 years since thirteen British colonies agreed to “dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth [a] separate and equal station.”

Leading the way, and supplying the newly United States with four of its first five presidents, was the Commonwealth of Virginia. Ironic, since this colony was named for Elizabeth I, England’s “virgin queen.” The Declaration of Independence penned by Virginia planter Thomas Jefferson was carried out by his neighbor General George Washington. As president of the new nation, Washington was succeeded by New Englander John Adams, followed by Jefferson and then two more Virginians, James Madison and James Monroe.

Allan_Ramsay_-_King_George_III_in_coronation_robes_-_Google_Art_Project — George III in his coronation robes, painted by Allan Ramsay

The British king who lost this valuable chunk of real estate was George III. While the American states struggled to form a viable union, King George struggled with mental problems. That battle too he lost. In 1811 his son (also George) took the reins as Prince Regent–launching the period we know as the Regency.

A farm similar to Washington’s Mount Vernon and Jefferson’s Monticello is the setting for my novel Dark Horseman; Mystery, Adventure, and Romance in Regency Virginia. The Ballards of Belmont, however, specialize in raising horses . . . which were not pets or a pastime in that era, but an essential source of transportation and labor.

King George III had more real-estate problems than just the American colonies. After they revolted, so did the people of France. The French overthrew their king, but soon found themselves ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte. Hungry to expand his empire, Napoleon decided to conquer Britain.

This is how the United States annexed the Louisiana Territory: Napoleon sold it to the Americans in 1803 to pay for his planned conquest. President Jefferson was no empire-builder, but he recognized a good deal: $15 million to get France out of not just Louisiana and surrounding states, but large parts of what is now the midwest and Canada.

The American takeover brought important changes in the Louisiana Territory. The clash between the still rather Puritanical culture in the United States and the French colonial culture in and around New Orleans affected everyone from priests to pirates. This is the chaotic moment when my Regency Rakes & Rebels romance Lady Barbara & the Buccaneer takes place.

Napoleon tried every possible angle of attack on Britain: massing armies at French ports along the English Channel, building a National Flotilla of invasion barges, erecting a triumphal column, even appointing balloonist Sophie Blanchard to help with an air assault. His hopes died in 1805 when the British Royal Navy kicked French stern at the Battle of Trafalgar.

Part of Napoleon’s plan was to distract the British by attacking their North American possessions. Britain still hadn’t entirely accepted losing its mainland colonies to the United States, and kept a death grip on its share of Canada, Bermuda, and the West Indies. So determined were the British not to cede any more turf–but to get back some, if possible–that they cosied up to their longtime enemy Spain, which still held West Florida. At the time Lady Barbara & the Buccaneer takes place, in early 1814, Britain was moving its North American forces from Halifax (Canada) to Bermuda, and lobbying to share the Spanish HQ at Pensacola.

Piracy had been rife in the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico some 200 years earlier, since the first treasure ships started hauling booty back to Europe which the colonizers had plundered in the New World. The “Pirates of the Caribbean” era died out when the nations of Europe got tired of having their ships captured by each other. Collectively they agreed to quit issuing the lettres de marque under which pirates had claimed to act as agents for one or another government. But the treasure ships didn’t stop sailing; and as alliances changed, along with local economic circumstances, a new kind of piracy emerged.

Jean Laffite and his brother Pierre headed a buccaneering operation centered at New Orleans. They themselves weren’t so much pillage-and-burn pirates as rogue merchants. The islands of Barataria Bay made an ideal hiding place for ships to smuggle in goods; and when the city of New Orleans got too hot for them, the Laffites established the offshore island of Grand Terre as their central market. This map from William C. Davis’s excellent book The Pirates Laffite shows where the Regency-era buccaneers plied their trade. It’s here that Lady Barbara goes to celebrate Carnival (the Puritanical Americans having outlawed Mardi Gras) and finds more adventures than she bargained for.

Writing Rules? or, The Spelling Conspiracy

Posted on June 25, 2014June 25, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by CJ Verburg

Noah Webster created his first dictionary to help Americans build a nation on the most basic level. Like the war, his “Blue-Backed Speller” was revolutionary. Why should citizens of the newly United States stay yoked to Britain with words like traveller and colour, when traveler and color are a better match for how we speak and write?

The purpose of any dictionary is to aid communication. If each person spells a word however s/he hears it, can people be sure of understanding each other? Is Shaksper the same man as Shakespeare? Does it matter if your plan affects or effects the solution to my problem? Webster, like other lexicographers, believed that when a nation agrees to spell the same word the same way, its citizens communicate better.

The same belief underlies the rules of grammar and punctuation. Take the serial comma. Unfashionable though it’s become lately, it can play a key role in a sentence. If Mr. Colbert’s will leaves his fortune “to be divided equally between Albert, Bertram and Delbert,” does that mean Albert, Bertram, and Delbert each get one-third, or Albert gets half and Bertram and Delbert split the other half?

Remember the book Eats, Shoots and Leaves? How you interpret that title depends on whether and how it’s punctuated.

In our Internet-centered era, written messages often are aimed at thousands or millions of readers. Savvy marketers pander to our resistance to lemming-think by hyping a mass illusion of individuality. Spelling and grammar are cast as villains–pawns in some evil conspiracy to stop you from expressing your full, real self. Convenience dovetails with this scenario: it’s only a text/e-mail; who cares? The consensus becomes: Why should I waste my time on following a bunch of old rules when (A) I have Spell-Check, and (B) everybody knows what I mean anyway?

Thus the following first paragraph in Daniel Newman’s June 17 e-column in Forbes:

“There may not be a CEO or entrepreneur on the planet who doesn’t smile just a little bit when they hear the phrase ROI. In a world that is fueled by obvious returns in periods to short to make meaningful progress (thank you stock market), the idea that measurability exists provides piece of mind to so many of those responsible for the vision, strategy and execution of their respective organizations.”

What is the impact of the typographical and grammatical errors in this paragraph? Spell-Check didn’t catch them. Do they keep us from understanding what point(s) Newman is making? Not so much as they reinforce the confusion created by his awkward syntax, i.e., arrangement of words in sentences. Does this opening paragraph give you confidence in the accuracy and importance of what its author is about to tell you? For me it created doubts, which were confirmed by this conclusion:

“What may be the most important take away from all of this is that the desire to connect dots that don’t connect needs to be avoided at all costs when trying to measure the ROI of certain marketing practices. For instance, the value of a follow, a like or (gulp) an impression; sure you can build an equation that will give you an answer but don’t be upset when I pass judgment on your for making ridiculous correlations.”

Takeaway? I didn’t learn any useful information from this column.

Spelling, punctuation, grammar, and syntax are not handcuffs or girdles, much less weapons of an elitist conspiracy. They are tools, like hammers and saws, for building reliable structures. You don’t necessarily need a hammer–you can whack a nail into a wall with your shoe and hang a picture on it, if you don’t mind sweeping up broken glass the next morning. You don’t necessarily need to take care how you spell or phrase a text, or even a blog or a column, if you don’t care whether the message received matches the message you meant to send. However, consider your purpose. If you are asking people you don’t know to trust you–in particular, to buy something from you, whether that’s an idea, a proposal, or your new book–you’ll do well to use the same language to send your message as they’re using to receive it.

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identified some unusual activity in your E-mail Account. So We are 
currently upgrading our Message Centre database. We are deleting all 
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First Day of Summer BOOK SALE @ARe/OmniLit, or What’s HOT?

Posted on June 21, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by Charisse Howard

Looking for a romance novel to kick off your weekend? On ARe today (June 21), search #AREBLAST for enough sale-priced romances (and other books) to last you all summer.

Or, if you’d rather not grope through a line-up of six-pack abs and calender-class bosoms, cut to the chase: Sail the Mediterranean from Tunis to Gibraltar with my short spicy Regency Rakes & Rebels romance Lady Caroline, the Corsair’s Captive for just $1.

If you love fast horses, fast-moving plots, disguises, surprises, and Shakespeare, try my full-length five-star “sweet” romance Dark Horseman: Mystery, Adventure, and Romance in Regency Virginia for just $2.

What is ARe? Long ago, in the dawn of indie publishing, i.e. 2006, All Romance E-Books started up as a small partnership near Tampa, Florida. They quickly gained a reputation as a go-to site for romance novels and particularly authors. Being run by romance fans, ARe became known as a friendly place to publish quickly and easily in multiple e-book formats. As business expanded, ARe added OmniLit to make it clear that they’re open to other kinds of books, too.

In a guest post on Dear Author this past February, ARe’s Chief Operating Officer Lori James described the current romance-publishing landscape. Anyone who’s been paying attention has noticed that what used to be called romance, back in the days of Mary Stewart and Georgette Heyer, has been steamrolled by what used to be called pornography. Lori gave a few gasp-inducing statistics. For instance: What would you expect to be ARe’s best-selling category as of 2012? (Hint: Jane Austen isn’t even in the top 5.)

M/M Romance
Erotica/Erotic Romance
Shifters & Vampires
Contemporary Romance
Horror & Paranormal
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Multiple Partners
BDSM
Interracial
Historical Romance

Whatever your taste, you’ll find a first-day-of-summer bargain at ARe, and probably a pile of books you’d never have discovered anywhere else.

Happy reading!

Today’s Book News from NY to SF (or, BPF’s BEA BBL @ BKP)

Posted on June 11, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by CJ Verburg

Thanks to Kat, Katie, & colleagues of Book Promotion Forum (formerly Northern California Book Promotion & Marketing Association) for bringing us up to date on this year’s BookExpo America, held 10 days ago in New York. Kristen Frantz, VP of Sales & Marketing for San Francisco’s Berrett-Koehler Publishers, attended the conference and reviewed highlights today over a brown-bag lunch.

BK, like a number of other publishers, has shifted away from hosting their own BEA table to utilizing shelf and meeting space offered by their distributor, Ingram Publisher Services. This freed Kristen and others to attend sessions and compare notes with colleagues. The latter she found more productive than the former: the sessions tended to be brief and marketing-focused, whereas schmoozing yielded quite a bit of useful info. For instance:

Neilsen regularly does research on book buyers which can help publishers: who they are, what they like, etc.
A new app called Books I Love asks readers to attach descriptive badges to their favorite books. Similarities in the badges for different books suggest that readers tag what they want > what they get, providing keywords for attentive publishers.
Making sure titles and content are up to date on the Copyright Clearance Center can boost income from permissions.
Goodreads is launching some new programs, including a 20-minute webinar/video for new authors which offers an update and overview of ways to use the site and its resources. Kat Engh observed that she now does a Goodreads giveaway for every BK book — a great way to spark interest and win visibility, especially if promotion starts a month or two before publication.
Audiobooks remain very popular with authors as well as publishers; and although many resort to Amazon’s ACX to create audiobooks, a number of independent audio producers still exist, including AudioGo and (locally) New Harbinger. BK plans to set up its own audio studio when it moves to Oakland in the fall.

ELSEWHERE on the SF end of the bookshelf:

Mechanics’ Institute Library will hold its annual Book’toberfest on Friday, September 26, 5-7 PM. A number of local book- and education-related entities, from to BAIPA to Zyzzyva, will have tables. Although this year there will be no presentations, there will be food and beer!

The Indie Publishers’ working group at MIL (which originated Booktoberfest) will hold its fall book event at 6 PM on Wednesday, October 29; details TBA.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST:

Congratulations to author Charisse Howard and narrator Stevie Zimmerman on their five-star rating for the audiobook version of Lady Annabelle’s Abduction, Regency Rakes & Rebels #1! To celebrate, Boom-Books is dropping the price of Lady Barbara & the Buccaneer, Regency Rakes & Rebels #2, to 99¢. For a wild adventure at a pirates’ Mardi Gras on a Louisiana bayou isle in the War of 1812, download Lady Barbara (and Lady Annabelle) to your favorite e-device tonight!

Someone’s about to get Croaked!

Posted on May 21, 2014May 21, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by CJ Verburg

“If Lydia Vivaldi hadn’t tried to read the Cape Cod Times Help Wanted ads while driving, she wouldn’t have wound up on the side of 6A with a flat tire. Her yellow Morris Minor wouldn’t have caught the eye of Alistair Pope, passing in his vintage Mercedes. Lydia wouldn’t have joined Alistair at Leo’s Back End for lunch; Leo wouldn’t have hired her to replace his assistant cook, Sue, who had just stormed out in tears after Leo diluted her split-pea soup; and the murder rate in Quansett, Massachusetts, might have stayed at zero.”

Just about now, at the end of May, is when Lydia Vivaldi fled Cambridge for Cape Cod and launched “Croaked: an Edgar Rowdey Mystery.” To celebrate that benchmark and the verge of a new summer, Boom-Books is offering $1 off the Kindle e-book on Thurs. 5/22 ($2.99 instead of $3.99).

Thanks to RP Dahlke & All Mystery Newsletter for inspiring and promoting this 1-day sale!

I’ll be on Cape Cod for the actual anniversary, and to see Rick Jones’s 2014 show at the Edward Gorey House: “F is for Fantods: an Exhibit of the 28 Books of Edward Gorey’s Fantod Press.” According to rumor, this is the best show ever since Edward’s house became an artistic and biographical museum. Catch it if you can!

You’re also invited to donate to Chris Seufert’s Kickstarter campaign for his Edward Gorey film. Chris reminds us that although the campaign reached its original target, much more money is needed to cover Mooncusser Productions’ expenses, including use of as much of Edward’s art as they can afford.

Best wishes for a fine Memorial Day weekend!

News, Reviews, & Thank-Yous

Posted on May 15, 2014 by CJ Verburg

As Boom-Books celebrates our third anniversary, and our first audiobook, we want to THANK YOU for your essential part in our success!

If you bought a copy of any of our books, or asked your local library or bookstore to buy one, THANK YOU!

The #1 way readers find out about books they’d like to read is from other readers. If you posted a review on Amazon, Goodreads, or elsewhere of CJ Verburg’s Edward Gorey On Stage…a Multimedia Memoir, or Croaked: an Edgar Rowdey Cape Cod Mystery, or Silent Night Violent Night: a Cory Goodwin Mystery — THANK YOU!

If you’d like to review one or all of Charisse Howard’s short spicy Regency Rakes & Rebels romances — Lady Annabelle’s Abduction, Lady Barbara & the Buccaneer, Lady Caroline, the Corsair’s Captive — THANK YOU in advance!

We’ll be happy to e-mail you a free review copy of any of our books, including the new Lady Annabelle audiobook, brilliantly narrated by Stevie Zimmerman. Just e-mail us the title and format you want at [email protected].

THANK YOU to Stevie Zimmerman, the brilliantly versatile and expressive British-born narrator of Lady Annabelle’s Abduction; to artist Barbara Oplinger, who designed the eye-catching covers for Dark Horseman, the award-winning Croaked, and Edward Gorey Plays Cape Cod; and to Richard Arnold, comrade-in-arts for many decades, who drew the wonderful chapter-opening garlands in Silent Night Violent Night.

Boom-Books news:
– Charisse Howard is delighted with the warm welcome listeners are giving her first audiobook. Lady Annabelle’s Abduction runs 2 hours 16 minutes, a little longer than the average movie, and costs less ($6.95). It’s a perfect accompaniment for commuting, chores, or relaxing, and a perfect try-out for any romance fan who’s curious about audiobooks but not up for a big commitment. If Lady Annabelle does well, we’ll bring you audio versions of Lady Barbara and Lady Caroline later this year from Charisse and gifted narrator Stevie Zimmerman.
– CJ Verburg is chugging ahead on Zapped, the sequel to Croaked, which she hopes to finish in time for the holiday season. Look forward to a gala seaside fete which is cut short by disaster — a new challenge for those reluctant Quansett sleuths, artist Edgar Rowdey and soup-chef Lydia Vivaldi.

Other news:
– San Francisco’s Mechanics Institute Library continues to host the Indie Publishers’ working group on the second and fourth Wednesday of each month at 55 Post St.
– Next Wednesday, May 21, the Internet Archive will host the official launch of the Authors Alliance, a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving the public interest by supporting authors who create in order to be read, seen, and heard.
– Last but not least: If you’ve ever been involved in a theater production, especially a community theater production, don’t miss The Onion’s hilarious “Community Theater Gives Part Of Blanche DuBois To Kathy Fucking Hamilton” (thanks for that tip to thespian Bill Ring).

Make Art! Support a Film! Two Unique Kickstarter Opportunities

Posted on May 6, 2014May 6, 2014 by CJ Verburg

by Carol Verburg

When my friend, Cape Cod neighbor, and theatrical comrade Edward Gorey died in April 2000, I moved (temporarily) into his house. His executors wanted someone to keep an eye on his enormous trove of art; and I’d promised Edward that if anything ever happened to him, I’d look after his cats.

One of the first people I called at this grim time was Chris Seufert.

Edward and I had met Chris at C3TV, Cape Cod Community Television. Later Chris asked Edward for permission to follow him around with a camera and shoot what would eventually become a film. Since Edward wanted someone to videotape his puppet show of Cautionary Tales for Children — our first production at the Cotuit Center for the Arts, soon to be our theatrical home — he cautiously agreed.

Chris is endlessly patient and cheerful as well as perceptive and creative — a good match. He caught hundreds of beautiful moments and trenchant insights on film. After Edward’s death, Chris brought over his camera and recorded this brilliant artist’s private domestic landscape just as his executors started to dismantle it.

Now Chris’s company, Mooncusser Productions, is preparing to release the film. Want to be part of it? Join the fun on Kickstarter!

Once Edward’s house was squared away, and my own, too, I moved to San Francisco. That’s where I met the remarkable filmmaker Judy Irving. She was just finishing her wonderful film The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, an affectionate portrait of our neighborhood’s beloved flock of birds and the man who befriended them, Mark Bittner.

Over the past several years Judy has focused her creativity, patience, and insight on pelicans. She’s now completing a glorious film about these extraordinary birds, which I’ve enjoyed at two rough-cut screenings. If you’d like to watch pelicans soaring across the sky, skimming the waves, and flying under water, as well as peek into many secret parts of their little-known lives, join Pelican Media and friends by becoming a supporter of Pelican Dreams on Kickstarter.