Julie Zickefoose: Nature Artist & Writer

... More than almost any other contemporary artist, Zick has the ability to capture the spark of a living creature—the gift for translating motion and color into line and form, while retaining the essence of the bird.

...Few of us—even those of us who spend our days, and devote our lives, to the study of birds—interact with birds in quite the way that Julie Zickefoose has. Zick's avian experiences are not the run of your typical mill. Although I've handled and banded thousands of hummingbirds, for instance, I have never had one snake its long, exploratory tongue up my nostril. Throughout her life, Julie's been dealing with birds on a much more direct, sometimes startlingly intimate level than most people—as a biologist, rehabilitator, artist and conservationist.

...Roger Tory Peterson once observed that "love" is probably the wrong word to use for our connection with birds, since love is a reciprocal emotion—and birds don't repay our feelings. But what makes The Bluebird Effect such a rare and important book is how Julie provides plenty of examples from her own unusual life of times when birds do reciprocate—the "uncommon bonds" of its title, when birds appeared to repay her passion and concern with, if not love, then with trust and what may even be gratitude.