Many Cool Books from Dreamhaven

One of the great things about Heifer International is that they work hard to partner with groups local to the areas they’re working in. For example, in Guatemala they partnered with Green Mountain Coffee to help support families who were building sustainable, self-reliant coffee farms.

And the best way to do that was to provide honey bees to pollinate the coffee, as well as to produce delicious, sellable honey.

Improving Food Security and Nutrition of Coffee Farm Workers' Fa

There are a fair number of small-scale coffee farmers in Guatemala, but the harvest season is only 4 months, so they often have no income for the remainder of the year. This was Feliciana Martin’s biggest concern before Heifer gifted her some beehives, but she doesn’t have that worry any longer.

She collected 60 pounds of honey in the first six months and doubled the number of hives she owns. In addition to a sizeable increase in the yield of her coffee farm, which was struggling to support her and her daughter, she now has income from the honey to help pay for food, school, and medicine for her family.

Then she trained some neighbors on the proper care of bees and gave them hives to start them on their own road to increased independence. This is called “Passing on the Gift.” All Heifer recipients take part it, and it’s a big piece of what makes Heifer’s work so successful.

Martin dreams of a better life for her daughter. Now she can make that happen.

And only $30 gets a family the gift of honey bees

* * *

As an added bonus to helping a family make a better life, $30 also gets you 3 chances to win one of the fabulous books or games in our lottery.

We’ve amassed a staggering number of both via private donations, author donations, and donations from our lovely sponsors. This time around, we have a few things from DreamHaven Books in Minneapolis.

DreamHaven is a wonderful bookstore, and a small press as well. We’ve got a cool mix of books produced and published by DreamHaven, as well as some of the rare or limited books they’ve come across over the years.

  • 28 first edition copies of  The Night We Buried Road Dog by Jack Cady.

roaddog

“There’s not a bad story here. It’s easy to see why they were award winners and it’s a great volume filled with Glenn Chadbourne illustrations and a cover by Alan M. Clark. Don’t let this one get past you.” – Barry Hunter

This is a collection of short stories by the Nebula and World Fantasy Award winning author Jack Cady, who passed away back in 2004.

Greg, the owner of Dreamhaven, discovered a box full of first edition copies, and sent them all along to us.

  • 28 first edition copies of The Creature from the Black Lagoon by Vargo Statten.

creature

“This is a must-have for Creature fans and is highly recommended for horror fans who want to broaden their knowledge of this fascinating progenitor of many subsequent man-in-the-suit horrors, Dan O’Bannon’s titular Alien being the most obvious and arguably the most frightening in the cinema.” -Cinemaretro

This is the novelization of the creepy classic movie, and it features a lot of stills from the film in addition to the novel itself.

sick

“A Delightful anthology of gruesome rhyme” -The Dark Side

Anything Neil Gaiman works on is good – that’s an empirical fact. He helped edit this collection of poems that are both funny and gruesome, so there’s no way you won’t love it. Every $10 donation gets you a chance to make this book part of your collection.

  • 48 copies of Don’t Panic: The Official Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Companion by Neil Gaiman.

panic

“Certainly the most outstandingly brilliant book to have been written about The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy since this morning” -Douglas Adams

A lot of people don’t realize that before Gaiman did fiction, he was a journalist. And this is one of his earliest books – published in 1988, it was his second book, after, I am not joking, a Duran Duran biography.

  • 22 first edition copies of Shelf Life, Edited by Greg Ketter.

shelflife

“[Shelf Life] is laugh-out-loud funny. Bookshop owners and habitués will appreciate the palpable affection for literary havens.” -Publishers Weekly

Greg is the owner of DreamHaven, and he’s put together a collection of stories about bookstores. This is the original hardcover printing with 5 bookstore-centered stories, and an introduction by Neil Gaiman.

It’s something that’s close to all of our hearts, I’d guess, and 22 of them have been put into the lottery.

* * *

The finish line is in sight, folks. We’ve rounded the corner, and are on the straightaway.

All of our auctions are ending Sunday night, so if you’ve been waiting to snipe something, now’s the time. There won’t be any more added before the fundraiser is over.

If you want to get an entry (or 3) into the lottery, you get one for every $10 you donate on our fundraising page. $30 get you three entries in the lottery and a family gets honey bees. $60 is enough to buy a family fruit trees, plus you get six entries in the lottery. $120 gets you twelven entries and one of my favorite donations: a goat.

And there’s only a few more days you can get something from The Tinker’s Packs and be sure it’ll arrive in time for Christmas. We have books, games, t-shirts, scarves, and even a stuffed owlbear, all of which could make someone very happy as a holiday gift.

Enjoy your weekend, folks. And keep spreading the word. We can’t do this without you.

This entry was posted in Worldbuilders 2015By Pat7 Responses

7 Comments

  1. asdrubael
    Posted December 11, 2015 at 7:42 AM | Permalink

    And don’t miss that there is an amazing new stretch goal when we hit $1,100,000:
    http://www.worldbuilders.org/stretch-goals/stretch-goals-2015/max-temkin-cleans-pats-office

  2. babblefish
    Posted December 11, 2015 at 10:21 AM | Permalink

    Sounds like an evil villain’s power. “I give you….. THE GIFT OF BEES!!!”

  3. Kthaeh
    Posted December 11, 2015 at 12:47 PM | Permalink

    Hey Pat, I’ve wondered about the “other side” of Heifer for a while now. I mean, being on the receiving end of the charity. I wonder if you would be able to ask Heifer to illuminate this for your readers. How does Heifer select, from among many people in need, the individuals who receive these animals or other benefits? Once selected, what is the training like? How long does it take? How do they select the people to whom the gift is passed on? Do they have a free hand in making this selection? Or does Heifer have some say? I would really love to hear more about Heifer from the recipients’ perspective.

    The one aspect of Heifer’s work which I think is routinely undersold is the psychological effect which must happen when someone goes from being a recipient of aid to someone else’s benefactor. I can only imagine that this must be a monumental shift.

    • Celt42
      Posted December 11, 2015 at 5:24 PM | Permalink

      ^^ This.

  4. Posted December 11, 2015 at 3:38 PM | Permalink

    OK, I hold you and Worldbuilders personally responsible for my Amazon wish list that is now over _500 items_ long. *steam*

    (Seriously? Some of the best books I’ve ever read came from the Worldbuilders fundraiser. Thanks, man.)

    SJ

  5. StacyLou
    Posted December 12, 2015 at 11:15 AM | Permalink

    Hi Pat!
    I’m so very impressed with the work you and your team are doing with this fundraiser. This community that you’ve created is simply amazing. You have a really big heart. Let me share a story with you.
    My husband and I have wanted to get goats for ourselves for several years (and chickens, and maybe a couple of cute alpacas, and a few barn cats). So, we have been saving up money to build a barn because goats (and any other critters, for that matter) need a nice place to call their own too, you know. Normal Wisconsin winters can be pretty brutal.
    When I read the beautiful words you wrote about your mother and your offer to match, I was inspired. I went right over to the WorldBuilders website that day and donated. It warms my heart to say that I bought a goat that day.
    I’m glad to be a part of this wonderful thing that you’ve created. You are a very generous soul, Pat Rothfuss. Your mother would be very proud.

  6. LizisSparta
    Posted December 13, 2015 at 6:38 AM | Permalink

    As excited as I am about the fundraiser itself, I’m a bit glad that I’ll be over soon – I bet Pat’s, Amanda’s and all the other worldbuilders’ families are happy to have their spouses, dads and moms back to themselves soon…
    You guys have, once again, accomplished a massive success against wordlhunger and poverty and I’m stoked to have been a small part of it all this year. Much love to all of you and enjoy the remainder of the Christmas season!

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