Airleaf Victims

2012-01-03T08:16:00.006-05:00

Dear Airleaf/Jones Harvest Victims and Friends,

First, allow me to wish all of you a happy, healthy, and peaceful holiday. I wanted to share some important news with you as I continue to seek justice for our group.

1. Some of you have written to me over the years to tell me that your books were still listed on places like Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I couldn’t understand that since Airleaf has been out of business since 2006. Of course, Amazon doesn’t feel the need to answer this question from anyone—including me. I’ve contacted their legal department in the past with no response. So when another author recently contacted me about the dilemma, I decided to check it out.

Here is what my research showed. Some of the books published by Airleaf are still listed on Amazon and other outlets as available for order. One such book posted on Amazon said that 3 of the Airleaf copies were still available. The author never republished after Airleaf. Out of curiosity, I ordered one copy and the author ordered one copy. Now one copy was listed as remaining on the Amazon site. We both received our copies from Amazon several days after the order was made. Now the question is this: Who gets the royalties from the sales? To the best of my knowledge, I believe that Carl Lau is getting the royalties.

Why? My publisher, Paul Rabinovitch from CCB Publishing, explained that publishers have contracts with printers, distributors, retailers, etc., including Amazon and/or one of their subsidiaries. Just because Airleaf is out of business doesn’t necessarily mean that the contract with Amazon or the other outlets like Barnes and Noble was ever broken with Carl Lau, as long as Airleaf’s accounts are in good standing with these companies.

Some of you sent me your concerns that Amazon is reprinting your book and selling it. I don’t believe this to be true. I think that any of the few copies that are listed as “available” are the copies Airleaf provided them that were stored in their inventory. Two of our authors worked on this experiment with me. Once we bought the few available copies on Amazon, no more were listed. In fact, at the suggestion of my publisher, Paul from CCB, I called Amazon on two different occasions trying to reorder eight copies of those specific books for a book club meeting. Amazon’s Customer Service tried their best to reorder the books, but by the end of their research, they told me that the books would not be available any time in the near future. They stated if they would become available, they would notify me. So it appears that the last of the Airleaf inventory is being sold off and then the books will be unavailable unless you republish them.

Even so, I am really trying to get a handle on this because something is wrong. Here’s what I am asking you to do if you published with Airleaf or Bookman, Airleaf’s previous name. Please go to Amazon.com and check whether or not you are able to buy a copy of your book. If you haven’t republished, check if Amazon has any copies available for purchase. Even if you have republished, check and see if the original Airleaf version is still listed and available for sale. Unless you notify Amazon that you want the Airleaf or Bookman version removed from their website, chances are it is still listed by both Airleaf and your new publisher. If any of your Airleaf or Bookman books are available through Amazon, please order one copy and see if it arrives. As soon as you get confirmation, please forward the message to me or email me when you receive the book so I can begin a paper trail to see if Airleaf books are still selling. If they are, someone is getting the royalties—and it is not you.

I don’t believe there are many Airleaf books left in stock, but even if there is one, the money should not be going to Carl Lau. I have asked a lawyer friend of mine to contact Amazon once I compile this information, and he has agreed to do that on our behalf. Hopefully we will finally be able to find out who is getting your royalties. Please write to me at Bonkaye@aol.com after you check your book and if it is still listed on Amazon. I’m hoping we can resolve this before the spring.

2. It really does bother me that crooks who stole so much money from us are able to keep going through life without any real accountability. For instance, Carl Lau destroyed the so many of our authors through his fraudulence, and yet he goes unpunished. In fact, he is working in a Finance Company in Indiana called Royal United Mortgage. A Finance Company—playing with people’s money. Can you believe it?

When I learned this information several months ago from one of Lau’s relatives who contacted me in disgust after reading my website, I sent a letter to his boss. This is what it said:

To: Craig.Royal@royalunitedmortgage.com

Dear Mr. Royal,
It recently came to my attention that you are employing Carl Lau, former owner and operator of Airleaf Publishing in Martinsville, Indiana. As the leader of over 600 members of our group, Airleaf Victims, who were defrauded in figures reaching nearly three million dollars in one of the largest publishing scams in this country, I find it disturbing that your organization that uses the word "Integrity" in your advertising would allow Mr. Lau to be part of its team.

In fact, I find it very frightening to think that you would have a man handling your mortgages in view of the attention that predatory lending has received in recent years. I would like to think that employees in this position actually did have "integrity."

Mr. Royal, please read my site at www.AirleafVictims.com. If you do a minimal amount of research, you will find the judgment from two years ago that the government of Indiana handed down on behalf of the claims of a small segment of our authors for over $325,000.00. Because of the immense number of victims, the government had to set a window to limit the claims, so less than 15% of those who requested a refund were part of the judgment. Sadly, none of us who were rewarded compensation by the Attorney General’s office received one penny because Mr. Lau declared bankruptcy to avoid paying us the money he took from us for fraudulent services and book royalties. Even after the judgment was handed down, Mr. Lau continued to receive royalties from our hard work and kept it for himself.

This also leads us to wonder if your organization did a basic background check of Mr. Lau. If you did, you would have found that he was in bankruptcy in addition to having a government judgment against him. If you wish, you can contact the Assistant Attorney General's office and ask for Tom Irons who spearheaded the case. After I hear back from you, I will notify him of Mr. Lau's employment. You can reach him at Tom.Irons@atg.in.gov in case you have any doubts.
I am surprised that a company that has "integrity" would allow a crook of this magnitude to work for it.

My organization would appreciate a response from you as to why your company thinks that a man who has robbed the most vulnerable of vulnerable--elderly, disabled, religious leaders, and poor people who invested every penny they saved for a dream that turned into a nightmare--should be trusted to work with other people, many who are in the same position as we were. I would to give you an opportunity to respond before making this public.

Sincerely,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.
Organizer, Airleaf Victims
www.AirleafVictims.com

I did send the letter twice. And of course, I received no response. However, at least you can now know where Carl Lau is working. And if you’d like to speak to him directly, feel free to call him there. The phone number is: (317) 664-7700 x7941. I’m sure he’d be happy to hear from you. Or you can feel free to email the director of the company who hired him, Craig Royal, at: Craig.Royal@royalunitedmortgage.com. Maybe if Mr. Royal hears from enough of our members about his employee, he’ll do something about it.

3. How is it when con-men in this business like Brien Jones go out of business, he can still continue to cheat his authors? Unbelievable, isn’t it? Well, it seems like con men always find partners, especially in the state of Indiana where government views “fraudulence” as “bad business practices” rather than a crime.

Authors first were sent a letter by Brien Jones several weeks ago bemoaning his “hard luck” in the publishing industry. To special “friends,” he sent this letter, making each of them think they were getting some special personalized letter—which they weren’t. Everyone I know who had any contact with Jones has received this with the name and the book title being the only thing that is “personalized.” Here it goes:

Dear _________________,

Enclosed is the letter we sent to all of Jones Harvest Publishing authors and vendors. Unlike some of those folks you were always a friend and supporter, and you deserve an explanation as well as my advice on where to go from here.

Six months before we closed I sent a long letter explaining the huge challenges we faced selling books and asking for suggestions.

The short version is bookstores didn’t pay when they ordered our books. JHP had to pay to ship books with an invoice. That was after we paid to print the books. If a store ordered a copy of _________________, they paid nothing. But I had to pay to print and ship the book.

If the bookstore ever paid they sent a check of 50%, but didn’t send that check to us. They sent that check to Baker & Taylor. Later B&T would send us a check for 40%. That was the best case scenario. More often we just received the front cover (stripped off to prove the book was unsold) often over a year later. I didn’t receive any suggestions.

That was with a Jones Harvest Publishing book. Getting even that far with a book from Authorhouse, Infinity or Vantage Press was impossible. When I said Xlibris I heard ‘click.’ Yet even against those odds, I tried to sell __________________ and the rest every way possible—more ways than you ever heard about. As with 99% of our titles I failed. It’s hard. And if you ever try selling somebody else’s book (or even your own) to bookstores you’ll find it’s also unpleasant.

By 2010 I spent half my day listening to bookstores hang up on me and the other half listening to authors that paid $950 to publish (usually less than we spent on the print run) complain about lack of sales. I have to admit I don’t feel very bad about giving up on some of those clients.

I do feel bad about you. You were one of the few that even acknowledged our website was free of vanity publishing information or that we had a bookstore. Most of our clients never noticed. I kept on trying anyway. The in 2011Borders closed 275 stores. Limping along and hoping was no longer possible.

To be a success in the self-publishing industry I would have to change everything. To survive I would have to be like all the rest and focus on selling authors their own books. That’s when I made an important discovery. I don’t want to be a success in vanity publishing.

I wish I could suggest another publisher that’s selling books, has a bookstore or even a website designed for that purpose. There aren’t any. The only subsidy, self or print-on-demand publishing companies with any promotion services are the same ones we’ve all known for years. They’re now offering “publicity” and “promotions” at appalling prices.

However, in my own search for a publisher, I concluded the best choice for you is Accurance, a company I’ve known about for a long time. I sent my books to them because:
1. They aren’t going out of business. They’ve been around since 1999 and growing.
2. Amost all books they produce are for other publishing companies—you’ve heard of most of them. It’s likely the publisher you choose uses Accurance for their production work (editing, book covers, typesetting/formatting, and conversion to eBook). Therefore you can cut out the middle man which takes us to price.
3. JHP could not survive charging $950 to publish because we were never POD. We always did print runs. Yet Accurance offers everything (for publishers) for $899. This is possible because of volume. They actually have a program for authors left in a lurch, because their publisher closed. (It’s not just JHP, there are many more with others to follow.) They have agreed to publish our books for $850.
4. They also answer the phone, or call you back quickly. They answer emails usually within minutes, at most hours. Most of the other companies I called answered electronically and sent me to someone’s voicemail.

There are plenty of companies out there promising the moon for $999 (but calling you from overseas.) I wanted the whole package including Kindle and REAL BOOKS with no surprises. My recommendation is Accurance. THE JHP bookselling plan didn’t work. But I would feel much better knowing you are receiving real books with good pricing, integrity, and stability.

To your books as fast as possible and at wholesale prices call Bill Earle, Author Partner Project Manager at Accurance at 1-727-550-6258. I have already transferred files for my books to them and can do the same for you.

I hope you have no hard feelings. I’m not walking away with a boat or an airplane (or even our house) and I truly tried. I hope you keep writing and trying to.

Sincerely,
Brien Jones

Let me say I found this letter—well—hysterical and pathetic and somewhat sociopathic as Brien Jones truly is. It was filled with lies and gross exaggerations for sure. But I will discuss that in my next update in the near future. For now, this is a WARNING to anyone who actually might be foolish enough to get burned one more time by the master of con.

But first, let me share with you the follow up letter that most of you have received by now from Accurance, the only company that Brien Jones trusts which has “republished” his books about the scary pumpkin and the crooked Vanity Publisher based on his own life story.

Accurance’s Bill Earle sent this letter to the list of Jones authors:

Hello! I wanted to touch base and introduce myself, Bill Earle if Accurance, Inc., since I was mentioned in the letter you should have received from Brien Jones. We are happy to be able to step in and offer our years of expertise to you for your current book that was published and future books. We have been around a long time and we aren't going anywhere.

Right now, we are concentrating everything on the Jones authors who were published with Jones. Those ISBNs are dead now so those books are no longer for sale. Even if sales were poor in the past for whatever reason, you don't have a chance at even one now.

Our Jones Publishing Package, is fast, high quality, as affordable as is possible, and most importantly - complete. Right now, the book you had published with Jones is no longer valid. The ISBN from Jones for your book is a dead account. We are honored to be able to offer you the fastest way back to the market for just $849 as Brien's letter stated:

1. We will revise your cover and interior - and that means as many revisions as you want or as few as changing the "Published by"
2. set up a new publishing account with Lulu.com
3. purchase your new ISBN
4. upload your new files
5. order and ship a proof copy to you
6. purchase and set up your new GlobalReach distribution to the Ingram database of all titles for sale - fresh to the market with a new ISBN and a new look in some cases.

We will also purchase and ship to you 9 more copies of your book at the end of the process before we turn over your new POD publishing account to you to monitor future sales and always order as few or as many copies of your own book at cost. It also all comes with expanded free revision cycles and unlimited email and phone support.

This package is not available on our website for obvious reasons. To purchase now simply go to our Misc. Services web page at :
http://accurance.com/index.php?go=services&goto=author&gotogo=authmiscservice and add to cart 849 units - they will be billed to your credit card of PayPal at $1 per unit. As soon as the purchase (always completely guaranteed) is made you will receive an introductory email from me with everything you need to know. Then, you can sit back and let us get you back in the book selling business the best way in the world we know how, at a price only available to you.

I will of course get back to calling you back as well.

Thanks!

Bill Earle
your author partner
Accurance, Inc.
(727) 550-6268

With the directions from Bill Earle, I did go to the link in his letter which led me to the Accurance website page where you can purchase the 849 units for $849.00. But then I took a moment to explore the rest of the website which led me to the page called “Author Services.” It was quite interesting seeing the pricing for authors who weren’t getting the special Jones Harvest deal.

Here is the irony of the special “Jones Harvest” pack.
Here are the the prices for the non-Jones Harvest author services:

Publishing Set Up Package $249
For the author who has viable, print-ready PDF files who needs set up with a POD publisher for worldwide print distribution (includes ISBN & Proof Copy). Your files will be uploaded, your ISBN will be purchased, you will receive a proof copy for final approval, and be distributed on the worldwide database serving potential buyers at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and many others.

Book Cover Creation - $199
For the author who needs just the book cover (front/back/spin) designed. You will received a print-ready PDF cover file. Package includes three (3) revision cycles until your cover is perfect for you.

There is even this deluxe package:
The Whole Nine Yards Package - $799
Mechanical Editing/Interior Formatting/Custom Cover Design/Print Publishing/Distribution

Wow—editing your book and the rest of the whole nine yards. And here’s another great deal:

Ready-To-Sell Package & eCombo Package - $799
Interior Formatting/Custom Cover Design/Print Publishing/Distribution/eBook Conversion & Distribution

So let me see if I understand this. Accurance is getting the “viable, print-ready PDF files” from Brien Jones. According to their website, this is the Publishing Set-up Package they are offering for $249.00. If you decide to use them to redesign your book cover, the Book Cover Creation would cost $199.00. And that’s only if you want to have your cover redesigned. Otherwise, you can take off that charge. Okay—even if you want the book cover, that adds up to $448.00. Now, add in 9 additional copies at print cost—that’s approximately $36.00. So now we’re looking at less than $500.00 for the same services that Jones customers are charged $849.00. Hmmmm….

It gets even better. If you want the Ready-to-Sell Package & eCombo Package according to their website, this will cost $799.00. And that includes all the wonderful services of the Publishing Set-Up package, the Cover Design package, and the eBook package—all for less than the Jones Harvest Package. And even if you throw in the 9 extra books for $36.00, you’re still spending less than that special rate for the Jones Harvest package.

And guess what—if you take this route, you don’t have a publisher. Accurance isn’t a publisher—it’s a set-up company that brokers you out to companies like Lulu where you are your own publisher.

Anyway, even before I did the math when I first learned of this new alliance between Accurance and King Con, I wrote Bill Earle a note:

wearle@accurance.com
December 9, 2011

Dear Mr. Earle,
Since we haven't met before, I did want to let you know that if you have developed any type of positive reputation for your company, you should think about how it will be affected now that you are working with Brien Jones. In case you’re not aware, Mr. Jones is under criminal investigation by various government agencies for fraudulent practices against authors. Since it didn’t faze him about screwing hundreds of people out of hundreds of thousands of dollars, I’m not quite sure why you would want your name tarnished by being associated with him, but that’s your decision.

Please be aware that when I send out my update to over 600 Airleaf Victims and over 100 Jones Harvest victims, I will be mentioning your connection. Don’t expect great things to happen for you or your company because of that. I would really reconsider your relationship with him because it will really be a losing one for you and your company.

Best regards,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.
www.Jonesharvestfraudvictims.com
www.Airleafvictims.com

To date, I have received no response. Please, do not allow yourselves to become a victim one more time. For some of you, it has happened more than once. Remember—anything associated with Brien Jones will take bring you to a dark place where you don’t want to go. Don’t fall into this pit hole again.

Well, you will be hearing from me soon again with updated news. We are not done yet. With your help, we will continue to be VICTORS and not VICTIMS!

I wish you all the happiest and healthiest of all New Years.
Love, Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update September 13, 2009

2009-09-13T19:13:00.004-04:00

Dear Airleaf Friends,

Some news has recently transpired, and I wanted to update you about this information.
On August 21, 2009, a letter was sent out to the 120 of our authors who part of the cohort of the judgment filed by the Indiana Attorney General against Airleaf last year. This is what it stated:

Dear Consumer,
As most of you know, on June 30, 2008 the Office of the Indiana Attorney General entered into a Consent Judgment with Airleaf and its owner, Carl Lau. Among other things, the judgment contained a provision regarding restitution for your particular loss. For those of you who do not already have a copy of the judgment, please feel free to access a PDF version via www.IndianaConsumer.com. Our ongoing investigation since that filing was made revealed that Airleaf and its owner are insolvent and any attempt at formal collection activity would therefore be fruitless.

On August 3, 2009 Carl Lau and his wife filed a join ‘no asset’ Chapter 7 bankruptcy in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Indiana, under Case Number 09-11308-AJM-7. The filing again confirms our conclusion that further attempts to secure restitution are inadvisable.

Enclosed you will find a Notice of Bankruptcy Filing the Bankruptcy Court recently sent to my Office. Please note that the due date for “objections to discharge” is November 20, 2009. Bankruptcy law allows creditors (which you are by virtue of the Consent Judgment) to file a lawsuit within the bankruptcy proceeding to prevent discharge of the debt at issued if the creditor can prove fraud.

The State has concluded that such a lawsuit, even if prosecuted successfully, will not be collectable. Therefore, we will be unable to obtain restitution for your loss. If you believe you might wish to pursue such a lawsuit on your own, please consult a private attorney.

Sincerely,
Tom Irons, Deputy Attorney General, Consumer Protection Division

Okay, I wasn’t surprised—and I’m not quite sure why I felt upset. I expected the bankruptcy to be filed a long time ago because I heard it was in the process last year. But yet, I still felt a sense of anger because I know that Carl Lau has been collecting unemployment compensation benefits since going out of business. I also know that he did have some assets that were never really checked into like his yacht. Proof of those assets came the following week after I contacted our reporter friend Ron Hawkins at the Martinsville Reporter who dug up some interesting information. Here is a copy of his article:

August 29, 2009
By Ronald Hawkins
rhawkins@reporter-times.com

MARTINSVILLE

The Indiana Attorney General’s Office has ended its efforts to collect money from Carl Lau, the owner of the now defunct Airleaf Publishing and Book Selling, following his filing for bankruptcy.

A Martinsville-based marketing and self-publishing firm, Airleaf shut its doors in December 2007 following multiple complaints to the state attorney general, the Martinsville Police Department and Better Business Bureau of Central Indiana alleging that the company failed to pay royalties, publish books and deliver other promised services.

In May 2008, Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter announced the state had filed a lawsuit against Airleaf alleging it had taken money without providing the promised services in return. The lawsuit sought consumer restitution for at least 120 customers.

In June 2008, the state announced it had reached a consent judgment with Lau that provided for restitutions to the consumers.

A Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition, however, filed by Carl and Deborah Lau — who list a Carmel address as their home — in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis, has led the state to believe that further efforts to collect money from Lau would “be fruitless,” according to a letter sent by Tom Irons, deputy attorney general, to the consumers.

“Our ongoing investigation since that filing was made,” Irons wrote in a letter dated Aug. 21, “has revealed that Airleaf and its owner are clearly insolvent and any attempt at formal collection activity would be fruitless.”

The individual consumers, however, if they can prove fraud may file a lawsuit within the bankruptcy before the Nov. 20 due date to prevent the discharge of the debt, Irons wrote.

When contacted about the letter, Irons confirmed that it was his letter and “my signature.”

Bonnie Kaye, a Philadelphia-based counselor who organized an Airleaf victims group, said she wasn’t surprised by the state’s action, but that it reinforces her displeasure with the state’s efforts. She said her organization has more than 600 members.

“This is just another example of how the government of Indiana allowed a tragedy to happen to our authors whose lives have been shattered by the fraudulence of this company,” she said. “While Airleaf was alive and prospering, the AG’s office turned a blind eye when the complaints started pouring in.

“It was only after our actions forced Airleaf to close down that the judgment was handed down six months after the fact.”

Bankruptcy filing details

In the bankruptcy filing dated Aug. 3, the document lists $1,594,771 in total claims against Lau and $160,217 in assets.

Of that debt, the filing claims that $1,472,588 is in unsecured, non-priority claims.

The largest secured claim is $25,125 owed to Citizens Bank of Cumberland County in Burkesville, Ky., although there are several larger, unsecured claims.

The Lau’s debt list includes $74,445.81 owed to the Internal Revenue Service in employment taxes, $16,601 in state employment taxes plus $2,152 in state sales taxes and a $69,100 debt to the state for violations of the deceptive consumer sales act.

In addition to the dozens of debts to consumers listed in the 134-page document, the debts range from an American Express debt of $116 to $230,62 to Premier Capital Corp. of Indianapolis and $273,825 owed to CIT Lending Services of Livingston, N.J.

The bankruptcy also includes $19,999 owed to Author House of Bloomington, a self-publishing firm, and $4,600 to the Morgan County treasurer.

The filing states Carl Lau has no average monthly income, but Deborah Lau has an average income of $3,537 per month. He, however, has received $3,308 in unemployment compensation this year and received $13,192 in 2008.

Their monthly expenses, the document states, are $4,700 including $1,500 in taxes, but they have no rent or home mortgage payments.

Ronald Hawkins
News editor

My frustration comes from seeing that there is still over $160,000 in assets that could have been sought on our behalf. Also, the fact that Carl Lau owes the IRS and the State of Indiana payroll taxes really upsets me because he has received over $16,000.00 in unemployment compensation in spite of his criminal actions. Go figure! Also, as you see in the article, the Lau’s have no rent or home mortgage payments. This is because they moved in with Deborah Lau’s parents. While I used to feel somewhat sympathetic to Mrs. Lau, I don’t anymore. I would tell her the same thing I tell my women that I counsel—“If you don’t know the truth about your husband and he is doing the wrong thing, then you are a victim. But once you learn the truth and you choose to stay there, you are a volunteer.” And I don’t feel sympathy for volunteers.

The article states that Carl Lau owes money to Authorhouse. He owes it to them for stealing their database when he left there to start his own company. He had to make a payoff agreement with them out of court which of course was never paid off. So that shows Deborah Lau that her husband had a lack of scruples before she even knew about any of us. In addition, Carl Lau was forced to pay money for a sexual harassment suit that one of his former female employees contacted me about to let me know about her settlement. It was general information from all of the previous Airleaf employees that spoke with me that Lau was a sleazy guy watching porn on his computer and making sexual overtures to a number of the female employees or even groping them. And yet, his wife still remains with him. So now she is a volunteer, aiding a criminal. No, I don’t feel sorry for her at all. Deborah Lau is helping him avoid his responsibility of standing up and making amends to his victims. She obviously has no concern for us.

Don’t think that our efforts have been for nothing. Carl Lau will have a legacy that will follow him forever. Every time he goes for a job and someone looks up his name on the Internet, they will know what a crook he is—and this has already happened. His road will never be an easy one again thanks to our standing up and fighting back.

I called the Bankruptcy Trustee, Mr. Elliott Levin in Indiana, and spoke to him about our options late last week. There is a hearing for Carl Lau’s bankruptcy on Monday, September 21 at 1:30 p.m. in Indianapolis. Mr. Levin said any of us could show up at the hearing, but without an attorney, it’s hard to do much because an “objection to discharge” has to be filed. However, if any of you would like to go there to stake your claim, I encourage you to do just that. The hearing will only last 15 minutes, so it won’t be very long. But at least you can have a say. If you would like to go, or you would like more information, feel free to call Mr. Levin at 317-634-0300.

Although you know that I don’t have faith in the State of Indiana, I would like to thank Mr. Tom Irons for taking the Jones Harvest fraud seriously. This past week, at least five authors who were victims of Brien Jones in his scamming of authors received back money from the Indiana Attorney General’s office, and there may be more who haven’t contacted me yet. I have tracked 72 complaints from authors who were taken in by this company. If you have been scammed by Brien Jones in his new publishing company, Jones Harvest et. al, there is still hope for you to retrieve some compensation before he goes bankrupt. If you need help with this, just let me know. I will be glad to send you the information on how to file a complaint form or call you to walk you through with it.

I just wanted to give you an update. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

One last announcement—we are accepting new authors for our Books of Excellence Coop. Visit our site at www.BooksofExcellence.com to see how nice the site is. This year, we will be starting Blog Radio for our group with lots of advertising and marketing. We have a monthly newsletter where we provide marketing and publishing tips to help our authors. Write to me if you are interested.

Love, Bonnie Kaye
Organizer, www.Airleaf Victims.com

WRAPPING UP THE AIRLEAF BATTLE

2009-08-09T18:19:00.006-04:00

August 9, 2009

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

I am writing this last correspondence to you to let you know that I am wrapping up my efforts on the Airleaf case. At this point of time, I have gone as far as I can go, and it’s time to let go. All of the petitions that many of you were kind enough to sign will be sent to the U.S. Attorney Timothy Morrison this week. If by some miracle he changes his mind after reading them, I will notify you immediately.

I wanted to make sure that I explored every possible course of action, but I have to accept that I have come to a dead end. As so many of you have told me, it’s time to let go. From my point of view, there has been no justice for the Airleaf Victims. The fact that Airleaf closed down was due to our efforts in stopping their cash flow—not government efforts to stop the fraudulence. Airleaf was run by con men. They were experts in making people believe that we could become famous authors through a series of publicity efforts, which in almost every case, never happened. There were no European book fairs, no Bowker reviews, no Carnival cruise, or no Hollywood movies. There was just continued scamming of good people who worked long and hard at becoming authors.

Should you be angry? Of course you should. Most of you were taken for your hard work and hard earned money while others profited off of your innocence with airplanes, boats, trips to Hollywood where sordid affairs took place, and a plush life style built off of your suffering. In addition to the thieves who took your money so willingly but refused to provide you with the promised services, we had the State of Indiana to contend with. Its lack of concern for thieves in their State will always be my greatest reminder of how government doesn’t care about its people.

This has been a wonderful experience for me because it has given me the unique opportunity to get to know so many of you. I have developed life-time friendships with some of the most wonderful people I have ever met. I have read the words of some of the most prolific and profound writers imaginable. I had the fortune of meeting a number of you in my travels and in yours. So every moment that I put into this effort was well rewarded with new friendships that have enriched my life.

Although most of you don’t know much about me, I will share some things with you at this time. In the 1970’s, I spent nearly ten years of my life as an activist for a cause I believed in. I learned a lot in those days about organizing people and using the media to our advantage. I tried to take those skills and use them in our Airleaf campaign. Now with the advent of the Internet, it was easier in many ways. It allowed me to put up websites to alert people, send out press releases to the media, and stay in touch with many of you via email. In the past when I was in my 20’s, I went up against some of the most worthy opponents—and won--including the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in my battle to have Nazi War Criminals removed from this country, the New York Federal Court who did not allow people to view the deportation of a Nazi War Criminal, the City of Chicago (stopping neo-Nazi marches in Skokie, Illinois), the Russian government demanding the release of Russian Jews, and many others who were quite offensive to many people. I may not have won the war, but I certainly did win many battles.

Because of my younger years as an activist, I thought the Airleaf battle would be a piece of cake. It seemed so easy—people being robbed of their money. This was criminal—or so I thought. Little did I know that it wasn’t a crime to take people’s money under false pretenses in the State of Indiana. Silly me. I thought that robbing hundreds if not thousands of people would truly be against the law in any state in this country. It seemed so very cut and clear.

Sadly, at this point of time, I have come to realize that robbing people of millions of dollars is not a crime in Indiana—rather it is what they call “bad business.” Wow, I wish I was a crook. I know where I would relocate to. Indiana would be calling my name loud and clear. As I have told all of the officials that I have tried to convince to be on our side, I could set up a business selling dreams to people at $500.00 a shot, and if they didn’t come true, well, I could say at least I tried. Ha ha. No one there seemed to disagree with me.

The real culprits here are not just Carl Lau and Brien Jones. It’s the government of Indiana. In May of 2007, Airleaf was given an order through the Attorney General’s office stating that they would not conduct any more bad business with customers after having to pay out $12,000.00 to two authors and being issued an AVC order. When our first complaints started going to the AG’s office back in August when I sent the first of hundreds to come, nothing happened. Well, almost nothing. Actually, the Assistant AG at that time, Terry Tolliver, went with our police detective Jeff Buskirk to raid the Airleaf computers in October. This made me feel optimistic. But that was the end of the road. Nothing more came from that. When the new assistant AG took over, Tom Irons, he went to battle for us and a judgment was handed down five months after Airleaf closed. The problem was that the case stopped there. It was a “good will” gesture with no results. Carl Lau lost his home to the IRS, and supposedly his boat wasn’t worth going after. His partial ownership in the airplane wasn’t worth it either I suppose.

I believe that if anyone is guilty, it’s the government of Indiana that could have acted months before Airleaf shut down to demand that our money be returned, but they didn’t. And the final blow was when the U.S. Attorney, Timothy Morrison, refused to consider our case “criminal.”

I have pursued every possible course of action including writing to government officials in Washington, the President, every state representative and state senator in Indiana, the congressmen of the state, and the senators of the state. Heck, I even wrote to the governor’s wife pleading for help. Only one in over 80 representatives that I wrote to responded telling me that it wasn’t a State issue. So what’s new? I already figured that out with the overwhelming mounds of rejection that came my way in the form of silence.

I recently spoke to the lawyer of one of our victims who said we could pursue the case if we put up money. It would take lots of money—thousands of dollars. Then there is no guarantee that we would see anything. After all, Carl Lau lost his home and his business. What will we be able to take from? However, if a group of you would like to spend money pursuing this, please let me know.

So let me share some final thoughts with you.

Last year, a group of us began an author’s co-op, Books of Excellence. It’s a way for people to have a site they can refer people to if they don’t have their own website. We were overly ambitious in hoping people would buy five books a year from other authors. Some did; others did not. The majority of us decided this year just to pay yearly due for upkeep and publicity. I will be starting a new internet radio show in September with our authors one hour a week. This way, authors can promote their books via the computer radio stations and generate some business. We would be happy to have you join us. The cost to join is $60.00 for the first year which gives you a place on the front page of the website as well as your own page where you can advertise you and your books. After the first year, the dues are $25.00 a year. You can visit our site at www.BooksOfExcellence.com.

Many of you came to me with questions about republishing. There are three publishers that I feel confident in recommending to you. The first is my own publisher, CCB Publishing. Several dozen of us have republished there. You can read our testimonials on the website at www.CCBPublishing.com. The price is excellent, the service superb, and in a few weeks, your book is out in the market. Paul Rabinowitz, my publishing hero, works closely with each and every author day and night. He has all books distributed through not only local channels including Amazon and Barnes and Noble, but also the European channels, e-books, and his newest venture, The Expresso Book Machine. Here is some information about EBM:

CCB Publishing is pleased to announce a new distribution channel for its authors’ books. Placed primarily in bookstores and libraries, the Espresso Book Machine® (the “EBM”), a Time Magazine “Best Invention of 2007,” is essentially an ATM for books. The EBM automatically prints, binds and trims on demand at point of sale perfect-bound library-quality paperback books with full-color covers that are indistinguishable from most books on a bookstore shelf. The EBM can manufacture a 300-page book in less than 4 minutes while the customer waits. Books with black and white interiors will be universally available, while books with color interiors will only be available from certain sites. In addition to Time Magazine, this revolutionary new technology has been featured by The New York Times, Newsweek, Fortune, CNN and NPR.

Other participating publishers of note include John Wiley & Sons, Hachette Book Group, McGraw-Hill, Simon & Schuster, Clements Publishing, Information Age Publishing, Macmillan, University of California Press and W.W. Norton.

In addition to being featured at the Book Fair in London, England and at BookExpo America in New York City, there have been 16 EBM installations to date with many more planned. In addition to the following locations, current plans for 2009 include new installations in the United Kingdom through the Blackwell Ltd. chain of bookstores, in Australia through the Angus & Robertson chain and related bookstores, as well as in multiple locations at universities, bookstores and other retailers in North America and around the world.

Current locations:
• World Bank InfoShop, Washington, D.C., USA
• New York Public Library, New York, NY, USA
• New Orleans Public Library, New Orleans, LA, USA
• Internet Archive, San Francisco, CA, USA
• University of Michigan Library, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
• Northshire Bookstore, Manchester Center, VT, USA
• Brigham Young University Bookstore, Provo, UT, USA
• University of Alberta Bookstore, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
• McMaster University Bookstore, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada
• University of Waterloo Bookstore, Ontario, Canada
• McGill University Library, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
• Newsstand UK, London, England
• Blackwell’s Bookstore, London, England
• Angus & Robertson Bookstore, Melbourne, Australia
• University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia
• Library of Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt

Paul delivers what he promises—and everything is included in his one price of $750.00. This also includes 20 FREE BOOKS. If you would like to have your book listed as “returnable” for book store book signings, CCB can do this for the low cost of $100.00 for one year. If you check with other companies like Authorhouse, you’ll see that they charge $599.00 for this service. (Of course they are located in Indiana too, so don’t try to fight it!) You can also buy your books from Paul at $2.00 over the cost of printing plus shipping and handling.

The second publisher that I would like to recommend is Mountain Valley Publishing, owned by Bob Denton. I have come to know, care about, and appreciate Bob over the past year and a half. I wasn’t very nice to him in our early days, accusing him of working with Airleaf to hurt writers. I was wrong, and I know I’ve said it before—and I’ll say it again. Bob was used and manipulated by Airleaf as many other well-meaning employees were, and he did quit when he realized that there was no hope and authors were being screwed two months before the closing of Airleaf. He did try hard for authors, especially once Airleaf closed down. Bob was able—and is still able and willing-- to retrieve authors’ disks, and for many of them before the flood, their books that were sitting in the Airleaf offices. Sadly, once the flood came, Airleaf was flooded out along with nearly 50,000 books—and of course, no flood insurance.

Bob has republished books for many Airleaf authors. I have spoken with a number of them and they are always thrilled by his quickness, quality, and customer service. I have not heard one complaint yet from anyone using Mountain Valley Publishing—only words of praise. Bob does everything for authors from cover design, ISBN number, and bar code to Internet distribution. He has a special deal for Airleaf authors to republish your Airleaf book for $750.00 which includes 25 copies for free. If you want to buy your books, he only charges for the cost of printing plus shipping and handling which is an excellent deal. If authors have a new book, Bob will publish that for $995.00 and give authors 25 copies of the book which is still an excellent deal. You can write to Bob at bdenton308@comcast.net. You will find his contact information if you want to chat with him. You can also see his website at: www.MoutainValleyPublishing.com. Please read his list of testimonials from happy authors if you would like to become one of them.

One other publisher that I have heard wonderful things about is Helen Compton from Artship Publishing. Helen is a sponsor at our Books of Excellence co-op. Several of our victims are republishing with her and have the kindest words to say about their experiences with Helen. She gives tremendous thought and help with putting books together, designing the covers, and taking it through the publishing process. You can feel free to visit her site and get her contact information by visiting: http://www.galleryartship.com/ebook.html

On a side issue, I received a letter last week from a woman in Indiana. She wrote:

Bonnie,

My name is Linda and I have been following the Airleaf story with your group. I think you have a great group of writers there and I wondered if they would want to participate in a fundraiser to help raise money for cancer research. My relay for life team is going to have a celebrity auction and we're looking for writers willing to donate an autograph book or photo. If anyone would want to participate they can send them to

Linda Williams

309 E South St

Martinsville, IN 46151

This auction is in memory of two friends who lost their own battles with cancer; Rita Greenwood and Brenda Wisman. Thank you for your time.

Linda

If you would be willing to donate a book or two to this worthy cause, know that it will go for something positive in life. Please send your books to Linda at the above address.

Finally, I would like to thank all of you who put your faith in me. The battle of Airleaf Victims started for me during the year that I lost my beloved son, Jason, at the age of 23 due to his rare illness that was misdiagnosed in his final battle to live. Three years earlier, I had lost my daughter, Jennifer, age 22. My life was in a dark place when this battle began. I felt that life had robbed me of my greatest treasures, and now, once again, I was being robbed. I knew I couldn’t save my children—that was out of my control. But I didn’t want to feel like a victim. I always taught my children to stand up for something you believe in. I taught them that there are always hands reaching out to you—some to pull you up; other to drag you down. It’s my “Misery loves Company” theory of why people look to drag you down. I extended my hand with kindness in the hopes of pulling all of us out of the darkness that entered our lives when men with dishonorable intentions were lurking in our midst. Nearly 600 of you reached back and made this battle your battle so that you wouldn’t remain a victim—but rather a victor.

As I said earlier, I have met some of the finest people imaginable through this battle. I have relived your horrors story after story of how you were fooled and tricked into throwing your hard earned money out the window. There were many nights I cried myself to sleep thinking about your pain, and I made it my pain. Then I went through this horror all over again when some of our victims told me how they were being “re-victimized” by Brien Jones in his new company, Jones Harvest. Again I sent out notices to people to stop paying for services that will never happen. I gave Mr. Jones a run for his money, but he runs faster than me. I have over 80 letters from victims of his, but once again, the government of Indiana is impotent about making this a crime. At this point, I’m ending my battle against him as well. Too much negative energy is being wasted on one pathetic man. If authors aren’t willing to believe all the warnings put in front of them, well, so be it. Let their money be taken from them once again.

I would like to thank my predatory publishing guru Victoria Strauss for helping me through this maze and mess. Victoria was a constant source of inspiration, who helped me during some of my darkest moments when I kept feeling like throwing in the towel. Victoria and her partner, Ann Crispin, are the true fighters for the cause of predatory publishing. They have made this their life’s mission through their website Writer Beware. You can view their site at http://www.sfwa.org/beware/. Put that site in your favorites to keep referring back to because it will be a continued source of inspiration. Anytime you’re not sure about a company, check there first. Ask the experts who keep on top of this daily.

I would also like to thank Detective Jeff Buskirk from the Martinsville, Indiana police department. He made a hero’s effort to put this case together for us. He worked diligently day and night—and there were many nights—helping us present our proof of criminal action. Sadly, all of his efforts were also ignored. Jeff Buskirk helped me believe in the kindness of strangers. He could have said this wasn’t a case for him, but he never did that. He really needs to be commended for his good deeds in trying his best to “do the right thing.” I wish he lived in Philadelphia near me. He would truly be recognized for his good work.

Know that in moving ahead, I am always here for anyone who wants advice or for me to check out something for you. Please email me anytime at Bonkaye@aol.com. Many of you are my friends; some of you have become my extended family. We will always be linked through our tragedy, but we are survivors and have put life back together in spite of this.

Learn from this lesson, and hold your heads up high. You are receiving this email because you refused to walk away and chose to stand up and fight. For that reason alone, you are no longer a victim, but a victor.

Love, Bonnie Kaye

Animal Farm Revisited

2009-06-29T00:15:00.002-04:00

ANIMAL FARM REVISITED

When I was in high school, one of the books that left its profoundly affected me was Animal Farm by George Orwell. This was an expose of communism and how proclaimed “equality” led to slavery. It’s a story where the animals took over the farm seeking justice and equal rights for all animals, but in the end, the pigs outsmarted the rest of the animals and treated them worse than their human masters.

At this stage of my life, I can finally identify with one of the main characters of the book named Snowball. Snowball was one of the revolutionaries who believed in justice for the animals. He helped teach the other animals how to read and stand up for themselves. But this didn’t work for the greedy pig Napoleon. He wanted to live with special privileges at the expense of the other animals who were doing all the work. He knew that Snowball, the voice of sanity and reason, would circumvent his efforts to lead the animals back into slavery.

Napoleon started spreading lies about Snowball blaming him for everything that went wrong on the farm. When the other animals would question this, they were put down and isolated from the group until they agreed to believe the lies. Eventually, a pack of wild dogs attacked Snowball and drove him away once and for all. From that day forth, when anything broke on the farm or the benefits weren’t trickling down to the animals, it was blamed on Snowball. He was still creating havoc to ruin everything—or so the animals were told.

Brien Jones is a fraud. He has deceived so many people that I’ve even lost count. And when he fails, rather than accept responsibility, whose fault is it? Bonnie Kaye’s. Yep, it is all my fault. I have become his modern day Snowball.

Here’s an example of what Jones wrote to several complaining authors:

"The last time I sent out bookstore contacts, the author gave the list to Bonnie Kaye and she proceeded to call each and every one of them. Many of our books were returned. Now that list is proprietary. We should have kept it confidential from the start."

That’s pretty funny. No author has ever given me a bookstore contact. The ONLY bookstore I ever called was the one that Jones has pictured on his site. It is called Books N’ More an Indianapolis bookstore. It is there for anyone to view, so I called the store to see if the books were still being displayed. The owner told me they were taken down last July. It had nothing to do with Bonnie Kaye, but rather that the books weren’t selling and it was a temporary display.

One thing that should have kept confidential was the list of authors that Brien Jones provided me with to start the Airleaf Victims campaign. On his recent blog, he states:

"Everyone exalts Bonnie Kaye for putting together 600 Airleaf clients and closing the place down. In the teeny tiny world of untalented writers turned watchdogs and their blogs she reigns supreme. (Hey Lee, I knew you were a guy! It was an insult dumbass.) I wouldn’t include any further insults that could be used against you."

"However, there is another side to the Airleaf story, one never told. At the end of 2006 and the end of my time in Martinsville there were 3000 clients. I have no idea how many authors bought services from Airleaf in 2007 and 2008, I wasn’t there. So we’ll be conservative and add ZERO new clients after I left."

"Subtract out Bonnie’s 600 victims (and I believe they were victims) and that leaves 2400 Airleaf authors.Out of those estimated 2400 Airleaf non-victim authors, how many paid just for publishing? How many received their books and didn’t sign up for anything else?"

The truth is that Brien Jones provided me with the original list of approximately 500authors and their email addresses claiming these were “angry authors” who felt they were screwed by Airleaf. That’s how I started contacting authors in the beginning—with Brien’s list. I’ll be able to produce that for court when he someday takes me there as he keeps promising. Now it may be true that Airleaf had 3,000 clients—but I didn’t have access to the rest of that list like Brien had when he stole the data base from Airleaf to open his new company. And yes, I can prove that too because now I have the list. It’s with another list of his Jones Harvest clients with little notes he writes about each person next to their name so he doesn’t forget the stories he’s making up along the way along with some derogatory notes about some of his authors. That list was given to me courtesy of several of his ex-employees who felt that by giving it to me, it would be in good hands. I’ll be showing those in court as evidence as well. And also one more lie that Brien keeps stating over and over—Airleaf closed on December 21, 2007, not 2008. Brien had been out of there just about a year.

The funniest thing is that in the beginning of my Airleaf Victims campaign when I sent my letters to authors about being cheated by Airleaf, at least 80% of them were complaining about Brien Jones and not about Airleaf. He was the salesman who made promises to take their book to fame and fortune as he happily took their money but somehow ignored them after he drained them. In those days, I defended him to the hilt because I didn’t know any better. I believed his lies that he was a victim of Airleaf just like me. But getting back to the point, I didn’t have the list of 3,000 so there was no way for me to contact the other potential victims until recently. At this time, it would serve no purpose to contact authors because Airleaf is closed.

One last thought--even if his assumption was correct that there were 2,400 happy authors, does that negate the hardship, pain, and loss of money of the 600 who were scammed? Jones's logic would think so because that's how he conducts his business. It doesn't matter if over 80 people are accusing him of taking their money--he'll have a few dozen state they love him and that makes it okay.

And now for the update on the “Sue Bonnie Kaye” case. Brien is sending this letter to authors:

"Jones Harvest Publishing along with 230 (so far) plus SIX OTHER COMPANIES is finally filing suit against Bonnie Kaye. I already paid the Miller Law Group in West Lawn PA for the whole thing, so I don't need any money from you or anyone.
I have decided to include clients like you in the suit at no charge. Please believe me when I tell you her attacks on my company have hurt you and your books. You deserve compensation too."

"You don't have to do anything, or say anything, or pay anything, or go anywhere. You'll just get a share of whatever we get back.If you want a share of the settlement, all you have to do is say "Yes" and I'll add you to the list.
I would love it if you stood with us."

This is quite interesting because Brien doesn’t have 230 authors. According to his Amazon reports, he has approximately 150 authors who have published with him. And the funny thing is I have over 80 reports from authors who have been scammed by him who came to me for help, so somehow, these numbers just don’t add up.

But let’s say that Brien could find 5000 people to join a law suit against me. What is it he is suing me for? Telling the truth? Revealing that he has been deceiving authors and taking their money without providing services? Is this a crime? Are we all living on that Animal Farm where truth becomes lies and lies become the law?

By the way, in an effort to find a new way to make some money, since selling books isn’t what Brien is good at according to Brien when he tells authors:

"I hope you have noticed that you haven't received any letters about new bookselling packages. It's not because we ran out of stamps. We decided to make it or not, with the books and authors we have. We're still trying to find a way to sell books, when I come up with something I'll call."

Now that’s finally something that IS true! They are clueless in finding ways to sell books and they refuse to do what they have authors pay them for—like contacting every media outlet and bookstore within a 100 mile area of their homes.

So now here’s the Jones Harvest new letters sent to all the former Airleaf mailing list:

You don't need to send money or books.

I'll put your book on our websites. No charge, no obligation. I'll even make a few calls. If you want to send me books, I’ll try to put them in stores. (Again, no charge, no obligation.)

I worked at Airleaf Publishing through 2006, (they closed in 2008) and I just want to help out if I can.
http://www.jonesharvest.com/

http://www.authorgifts.com/

http://www.bookwheat.com/

http://www.myauthorprofile.com/

http://www.myperfectheart.com/

If you don’t pay anything and you don’t have to send me books, how can you become a “victim”?

Brien Jones
Author Celebrity Assoc.
Jones Harvest Publishing
Toll-Free 877-400-0075

Then when you say "yes" to this free offer agreeing to let Jones sell your book, here’s the next letter you get:

We have 800 books for sale on http://www.jonesharvest.com/ including yours. However, there are only 25 spots for book covers on the home page.

I can offer you one of those powerful places for 3 months for just $400. I can put your book on the top row for just $600! No one will have to type your name or title into the search box, your book is RIGHT THERE! That means any bookstore owner that looks at our site will see your cover!

I have one spot left on the top row, two on the second row and eleven more total. Whoever gets them first gets them!

Brien Jones
Author Celebrity Assoc.
Jones Harvest Publishing
Toll-Free 877-400-0075

The first book on the top prime row is “The Stone” by David Welden. According to the synopsis of the book:

The author reveals firsthand accounts of people who have been aboard alien ships. He also provides a detailed timeline of the chronology of Earth from 450,000 B.C. to 2023 B.C. Welden goes on to explain the genetics behind it all, including a discussion of mitochondrial DNA and the role of the Y chromosome.

This book was published by Jones Harvest in 2008 and the ranking on Amazon is #3,894,935. So if this is the first book on the first line giving it “prime time viewing,” you can imagine how well the others are selling—NOT. And yet, people are PAYING for those SPOTS?

I don’t understand how some people are still so suckered in. I have so many letters of people feeling ashamed for throwing their money into the bargain basement of the Jones Family Home, where their publishing company is located. Lots of people are spending lots of money, but who besides Jones is making lots of money?

There is no shame in being conned. It happens to decent, hard-working people who believe in the goodness of people. The shame is to allow it to keep happening or refusing to stop it when it happens again.

You don’t have to be a victim—you can be a victor. All you have to do is “Just Say No” when you receive an offer from Jones Harvest. If you want to give money to charity, make it a worthwhile one that you can at least use as a tax write-off.
Love, Bonnie Kaye

Getting Ready for Court

2009-05-24T19:31:00.002-04:00

GETTING READY FOR COURT
I’m blowing the dust off of all of my legal courtroom dramas that I’ve accumulated over the years and trying to “brush up” on defense tips before I go to court. From what I’ve read from some of the Jones Harvest authors who keep me posted on this fraudster’s shenanigans, Brien Jones, owner of Jones Harvest Publishing in Bloomington, Indiana, has gathered “196 of his authors, 3 of his ex-employees, and 6 companies” to join together in a lawsuit against me.

Actually, the numbers change from day to day, but here is the basic letter to authors:

I hope you have noticed that you haven't received any letters about new bookselling packages. It's not because we ran out of stamps. We decided to make it or not, with the books and authors we have. We're still trying to find a way to sell books, when I come up with something I'll call.

In the mean time, this is free.

Jones Harvest Publishing along with 190 authors (so far) plus SIX OTHER COMPANIES is finally filing suit against Bonnie Kaye. I already paid the Miller Law Group in West Lawn PA for the whole thing, so I don't need any money from you or anyone.

I have decided to include clients like you in the suit at no charge. Please believe me when I tell you her attacks on my company have hurt you and your books. You deserve compensation too.

You don't have to do anything, or say anything, or pay anything, or go anywhere. You'll just get a share of whatever we get back.

If you want a share of the settlement, all you have to do is say "Yes" and I'll add you to the list.

I would love it if you stood with us.

Brien Jones
Author Celebrity Assoc.
Jones Harvest Publishing
Toll-Free 877-400-0075

Since I know that Jones has written some compelling fiction in his day, such as his “The Scariest Pumpkin of Them All,” where he later took his company logo of a scary pumpkin from, I started wondering, “How do I start providing a defense against someone who can’t distinguish truth from fiction, or more to the point, from someone whose truth is fiction?”

Let’s start with 196 of his authors….or 190…or whatever the number is. As I read the Amazon quarterly sales reports that one of his authors forwarded to me, I counted 160 titles that are part of his publishing company. And guess what one of the 160 titles is? Yep, his book “The Scariest Pumpkin of Them All.” And as I examined the Amazon list further, guess what another title was? “The Year the Reindeer Went on Strike,” another Brien Jones creation. It seems like a prophetic book before it’s time when I read the synopsis: "Santa Claus searches for a new way to power his sleigh when his reindeer go on strike. First using penguins, then polar bears, Santa learns just how much he needs his reindeer. Can he work out a compromise in time?" This sounds similar to the real story of his employees all quitting due to his fraudulence and he needs to figure out how to get a book published before the legal authorities get to him. I don’t know how that book ended, but I do know from his ex-employees that they would never return. And then there is the third Jones book, his novel “The Manuscript” which according to Jones’s write up on his Starred Review website (page 4) will really make you think:

As the President of Jones Harvest Publishing, author Brien Jones draws on his experience in the industry for parodying the world of publishing in The Manuscript. Through his coruscating wit and wry observations, he takes off on subsidy publishers, aspiring writers, poetry, thrillers, and romance novels, as well as Indiana town.

Lee Goodwin is an author consultant at an Indiana-based print-on-demand publisher, Myownbook.com, where by paying $1000 aspiring authors can make their dreams come true and get their manuscripts turned into books. To be published by this company, a book has to conform to three rigid standards - it cannot be pornographic, dangerous, or racially prejudiced. But this applies for just the first three pages, since they are the only ones read by the publisher during the supposedly stringent screening process! Even though Lee has to sometimes contend with eccentric writers, insufferable poets ("I am not a big fan of poetry. I figure life is tough enough, why rhyme about it?"), and strange conversations (like when an author claims, "My dog is possessed by Hitler's ghost."), it is a job the forty-one-year-old divorcee enjoys.

Like I mentioned, his fiction is sometimes indistinguishable from his truths. But more to the point, 3 of the books listed on the Amazon list of 160 were his. And for a guy who is supposed to be such an expert on book selling, how come his books haven’t sold any? Actually, for that matter, of the 160 titles on the Amazon report for that quarter, I saw sales for 21 books.

Now let’s be logical. Am I, Bonnie Kaye, the cause for the lack of book sales for the Jones Harvest authors on Amazon? I think not. My attacks on not on Jones Harvest authors—they are on the publishing and publicity fraud of Brien Jones and Jones Harvest. What this means is that by exposing this company, new unsuspecting authors have a chance to read the truth before throwing out their money, and current victims of his fraudulence realize they have a way to fight back through my help.

I’m not sure what anyone can sue me for. I have heard from nearly 80 authors as of today who have sent me complaints about being scammed by Jones Harvest. I think it will be much easier for me to find them to testify then it is for Brien Jones to find authors who want to sue me for…..what exactly is it they are suing me for?

I know the wheels of justice turn very slowly, but in my heart, I do believe that honesty will always win out over dishonesty. Constantly trying to defend a lie is not only difficult, but exhausting as well. Remembering lie after lie is a full time job. But then again, Brien Jones has plenty of time on his hands. As he said in his letter, he’s not soliciting new authors and he doesn’t know how to sell the books of his old ones. But he has paid in full for a law suit against me. Maybe that’s why none of his authors have received their royalties this year.

I think I better start taping some of the Law and Order episodes I may have missed to brush up on some legal strategies. I promise to keep you posted!

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 19, 2009

2009-04-19T10:32:00.002-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 18, 2009

Dear Airleaf Victims, JH Victims, and Author Friends,

First, let me thank all of you who have responded with your support of willingness to sign petitions for the U.S. Attorney Tim Morrison. In addition to our group, we had 29 people respond with their kind offers of support to sign petitions after they read about us on Victoria Strauss’ blog on Writer Beware! I will be speaking in Connecticut on May 9 at the Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association on the issue of Predatory Publishing. I will take petitions with me to the event to get them signed as well. This is an issue that affects every independent author and needs to be heard.

I had sent a letter to the Attorney General in Washington. On Monday, I received this response:

Dear Ms. Kaye:
This responds to your of March 11, 2009, letter to Kenneth E. Melson, Director, Executive Office for United States Attorneys (EOUSA), seeking to have the owner of a private company criminal charges with fraud. Because of the nature of your request, your letter was referred to the General Counsel’s Office, EOUSA, Department of Justice (DOJ) for a response.
United States Attorneys, and their offices, represent the United States and prosecute violators of Federal law. By law, they have considerable discretion in determining whom to investigate or prosecute and what charges, if any to bring. EOUSA is not a supervisory agency for the United States Attorneys’ Offices (USAO’s). We provide general executive assistance, policy development, administrative management direction and oversight, and operational support for the 93 United States Attorneys’ Offices (USAOs). Accordingly, EOUSA does not have the authority to require a United States Attorney to investigate alleged criminal activity. This is a matter solely within the discretion of the U.S. Attorney and his office.
We appreciate the confidence which prompted your letter.
Sincerely,
Jay Macklin
General Counsel
I think that Mr. Macklin misinterpreted my request of “desperation” by describing it as “confidence,” of which I have none at this point. In other words, this office will not help us.
This week, I received two notes of passive-aggressive--bordering on antagonistic-- communication from Timothy Morrison, the U.S. Attorney in Indiana. I am sending you a copy of my original letter, his response to me, my response back, and his latest letter to me on Friday, April 17. Mr. Morrison is “picking” at my words and trying to deflect from the reality of our situation. After you read them, you’ll realize that we are going nowhere fast. However, that should make us much more determined to make this into a national matter.

In Mr. Morrison’s last email to me, as you’ll read later on, he states:

Few lawyers worth their salt are prepared to ignore new facts. When you e-mailed you were bringing “petitions from our victims with their stories,” I would certainly read those regardless of what was previously submitted to investigators.

I can’t imagine what “new facts” we could submit to Mr. Morrison unless the federal investigators were withholding information from him. This case is becoming more bizarre by the moment, but we cannot let this discourage us. I’m sure the government of Indiana would like us to go away, but we won’t. One author commented that “Bernie Madoff stole from millionaires and that was a crime, but a man who steals from hard working average people is ignored.”

I have attached a copy of our petition which is a Microsoft word document. You can either type in the information or print it out and write it in. Don’t worry if it goes into a second or third page. Just tell factually what has happened to you. If you have a printer, I’d appreciate it if you could print it out and sign it and send it to me. If you don’t have a printer, you can type in an X at the end where you give verify that you have filled this out and give me permission to deliver your letter to Mr. Morrison’s office.

Please be specific in describing what you paid for. If you would like to send me any back up or copies of information for me to submit such as promotional fliers of services you bought, feel free to do so.

Here is the correspondence this week:

From: BonKaye@aol.com [mailto:BonKaye@aol.com]
Sent: Friday, April 03, 2009 6:47 PM
To: USAINS-Webmaster

Subject: From Bonnie Kaye, Organizer, Airleaf Victims

Dear Mr. Morrison,
I was informed by the Indiana FBI today that you will not be following through with our case of fraud against Airleaf Publishing. I want you to know that I and the members of group find this totally unacceptable. I have provided the federal authorities with more than enough evidence proving criminal fraud. We have nearly 600 members who are part of our group from the United States and other parts of the world who have been robbed of our money, hopes, dreams, materials, and dignity. There are hundreds of more victims of this company that haven't found their way to us yet. Just within our group, the money stolen is in excess of TWO MILLION DOLLARS. We want justice against Airleaf Publishing and Carl Lau, the owner who not only took our money while he was in business, but continued to steal our royalties after he closed his company for many months to come.
By allowing this crime to go unpunished, you are sending out a message to the other predatory publishers that continue stealing money from unsuspecting authors that it is okay to perpetrate fraud in Indiana without getting punished.
We are committed to finding justice against this fraudulence. I will be coming to visit you in Indiana in June to present you with petitions from our victims with their stories. We will contact every government agency in your state asking them to intercede on our behalf. We will also contact your local media and the national media to bring attention to this injustice. We have been patiently waiting for a year and a half for justice, but now you have decided not to help us find it.
This is a true disgrace, Mr. Morrison.
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed., Organizer, Airleaf Victims

In a message dated 4/13/2009 2:43:40 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, USAINS.Webmaster@usdoj.gov writes:

Dear Ms. Kaye:
I would be pleased to meet with you sometime in June to receive written accounts from persons who have lost money in the Airleaf transactions. Please contact me when your schedule firms up so that we can arrange a mutually convenient time.
Also feel free to contact the national and local media and “every government agency” in Indiana. However, that may duplicate, in part, what you have already done. You wrote me on February 16, 2008, that you were “very distraught at the response of the Indiana government agencies, including the Attorney General’s office, the Governor’s office and the two State Senator offices.”
Nonetheless, on June 25, 2008, you wrote that the Indiana Attorney General had, in fact, filed civil suit against Lau and Airleaf and that you had identified 450 victims. A copy of the Consent Judgment dated July 8, 2008 is attached in a .pdf file. This judgment lists 117 victims and a $317,881.96 loss. Could you send me a copy of the supplemental judgments that include the rest of your people? Thanks.
I look forward to seeing you in June.
Tim Morrison, United States Attorney

Dear Mr. Morrison,
I feel as if we are living in two different worlds. You stated that you'd be pleased to meet with me to receive written accounts from persons who lost money from Airleaf. I have spent the past 18 months working with Rob Simpson from the FBI providing him with case after case of criminal action. Rob called me a week ago on Friday telling me that he and the postal authority presented the case to your office, and your office turned us down for criminal charges stating that you didn't feel that the cases met the criminal statutes of Indiana. He stated he wanted to call me personally because he felt bad that this decision was made. He told me he believed we had a case. I have spent hundreds of hours making sure that our group has sent in information and documentation about their cases to the FBI and postal inspector's office. Please explain how, after all of this time, you don't seem to know about these cases.

If Rob Simpson has given me incorrect information about your decision, this needs to be addressed. If you are saying you didn't say you won't prosecute the case, then please tell me.

At that point, I will apologize to you and let our members and supporters know that you are reviewing the case. Since the FBI and postal authorities have collected all of the information including interviews with ex-employees, why can't you ask them for the information? The police captain of Martinsville, Jeff Buskirk, spent over six months meticulously putting together all of our files. Would you like me to ask him to send them to you as well?

I would prefer not to come to Indiana if I don't need to. It would be a costly trip for me. I would prefer not to have to spend endless more hours getting petitions from our victims and supporters. I would be willing to stop all action if you are telling me that you will review the cases that have been collected by your agencies and the Martinsville police. Somehow, there seems to be a large disconnect here, and I would like to know what it is.

As far as the AG's office, the fact that a civil judgment was handed down means nothing to me. It was symbolic only. The cases that were part of the judgment were a small number of the total number of authors because the AG's office felt they would file the judgment based on of a two-year cohort. That's why there are so many more complaints than what the AG has in the judgment. There is no money to be recovered from the owner as I knew there wouldn't be from the beginning. This is why criminal charges are so important to us. The AG's office should have put a stop to Airleaf months before they went out of business since there was an AVC order issued in May of 2007. When the first complaints started flowing into their office, that should have been cause enough to close Airleaf down. But there was nothing done, allowing Airleaf to continue stealing money from people until my campaign forced them to close by cutting off the cash flow.

There is another crook in your state, Brien Jones, of Jones Harvest Publishing in Bloomington, who picked up the slack where Airleaf left off. He was the Executive Vice President of Airleaf who started his own "publishing" company in January of 2007. He laughs to people that Indiana government doesn't do anything while he continues to rob people of thousands of dollars. I have over 70 complaints from his new victims. I am working hard to end his business the same way I did Airleaf's.

Complaints were sent to the federal authorities as early as August 2007 when they started investigating it. Something should have been done then--but nothing was.
So, as far as I see it, nothing was done to bring justice to the criminals who stole our money. I am sure you have been reading the letters sent to you by some of our victims. It's not that just money was lost. For some people, it was their life savings. I have loads of elderly and handicapped people whose lives were shattered from this criminal action. We want justice, and this is in your hands. Martinsville couldn't handle the case because they don't have the resources. The AG's office handed down a judgment that didn't help us--it was too late to claim anything. Therefore, we are seeking, as we have from the beginning, criminal charges against the owner, Carl Lau, for what he has done to us.
Please advise me of what you are willing to do. Also please advise me if the FBI gave me incorrect information because that would really be discouraging.
Thank you for your response.
Bonnie Kaye

April 18, 2009
Dear Ms. Kaye:
You e-mailed that “I will be coming to visit you in Indiana in June to present you with petitions from our victims with their stories.” I willingly accepted a meeting upon my assumption that you planned to come to Indiana in June. Now you e-mail that “I would prefer not to come to Indiana if I don't need to. It would be a costly trip for me. I would prefer not to have to spend endless more hours getting petitions from our victims and supporters.” There is no obligation for you to come to Indiana. I am directing you to do nothing. I obviously misinterpreted “I will be coming to visit you in Indiana in June.”
Few lawyers worth their salt are prepared to ignore new facts. When you e-mailed you were bringing “petitions from our victims with their stories,” I would certainly read those regardless of what was previously submitted to investigators. The e-mails your people sent me contain sparse facts about their situation. Fewer than half were listed on the civil judgment obtained by the Indiana Attorney General and most e-mails contained neither a loss figure nor “note stating your story” as you also requested. Most did follow your explicit e-mail directions to advise me they were victims of criminal fraud and express outrage. “.. (Y)ou are simply either lazy or a coward--or perhaps both” or “you are incompetent and impotent and negligent” were unfortunately representative. Many cited the “facts” that the FBI and the laws of Indiana were on their side.
These cited “facts” are not determinative, but they are wrong. For instance, Rob Simpson works on an FBI-sponsored task force in his capacity as an Indiana State Police detective. He is not a Special Agent of the FBI. “I received a phone call from our FBI agent who was investigating the case,” you e-mailed your people. “The FBI agent was on our side.” I assume that was a misunderstanding. There must have been a misunderstanding, too, when Mr. Simpson told you that my office “didn’t feel the cases met the criminal statutes of Indiana.” My office is without jurisdiction to enforce the criminal statutes of Indiana. We enforce federal criminal law.
The Indiana Attorney General’s civil judgment may be “symbolic” and “mean nothing” to you, as you e-mailed me, but you are one of only 117 persons included, while the majority of your people are not. Restitution orders in criminal cases, just as judgments in civil cases, are frequently not collectable. That is unfortunately true. However, they are not without value, since a defendant who inherits money, wins on a lottery ticket or at a state casino can have that money attached on this outstanding judgment. I have seen it happen. And if it does, fundamental fairness demands each name and loss amount appear on an existing judgment. You e-mailed that the AG filed on your behalf and the others based upon “a two-year cohort.” I am unfamiliar with that term. What does it mean?
I remain prepared to meet with you, but impose no duty on you to travel here or collect further information.
Tim Morrison
United States Attorney

And so, group members, this summer I will be visiting Indiana. Maybe I’ll even meet with U.S. Attorney Timothy Morrison. At least I’ll make sure he receives our petitions to review the case.
For the next few weeks, I’ll be asking you to take a few moments to send emails to the leaders of Indiana to try to push them to move forward with our case. We cannot get discouraged because this is what people who should be doing their jobs are hoping for.

With love, hope, and determination,
Bonnie Kaye

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE 4/11/09

2009-04-11T07:06:00.002-04:00

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

This is a short update to keep you posted on our activity. After sending out the update last week of our rejection by Timothy Morrison to consider Airleaf's action a "crime" in Indiana, 128 of you responded to date that you will sign a petition to request the reversal of that decision, and 53 of you sent me a notice that you emailed Mr. Morrison to voice your objection to his decision. If you haven't had time to respond to the petition, please drop me a note as soon as possible so I can add you to our list. If you haven't sent your message to Mr. Morrison, please take a moment to do so at USAINS.Webmaster@usdoj.gov, The more of us who stand up, the more powerful our case will be.

On Tuesday, I will send out a press release to the Indiana news media about our case. I will announce the launching of my new site www.IndianaWelcomesCrooks.com which you can now click into and read. I have also had our Airleaf Victims website with your stories redesigned to look more professional. You can view it at www.AirleafVictims.com. I want to make sure that our message is heard loud and clear.

Last Sunday, I sent a letter to the 83 state legislators in Indiana. In addition, I sent the letter to the Governor's office, the Senators and Congressmen. It stated:

Dear (Indiana Legislator),

My name is Bonnie Kaye. I am the organizer of the Airleaf Victims group which can be seen at www.AirleafVictims.com. There are over 600 authors in our organization who were defrauded of over 2 million dollars by Airleaf Publishing in Martinsville, Indiana until we forced it to close through stopping its cash flow by exposing its fraudulence. In spite of our pleas for help to the agencies in your state which are there to protect people from consumer fraud, no action was taken to stop the company from operating until after the fact. Last May, your Attorney General handed down a half-million dollar judgment against the company from a cohort of 120 of our authors. The owner, Carl Lau, is declaring bankruptcy, so there will be no restitution. We pushed for retribution by requesting this man be punished for criminal charges. For 18 months, I worked with the FBI and Postal authorities presenting case after case of criminal action on Airleaf's part. On Friday, I was informed by the FBI that your U.S. Attorney, Timothy Morrison, has decided that our case doesn’t constitute “criminal action” in Indiana. My members, many of whom are elderly and disabled victims, are in shock.

The FBI and Postal authorities presented hard core evidence of criminal action by this company. Mr. Morrison has decided it’s not worth his time to pursue the case. This is unacceptable to our authors from this country and other countries who are victims of one of the largest predatory publishing scams in American history.

I am appealing to you as an elected official of Indiana to ask Mr. Morrison to reverse his decision. I will be coming to Indiana from my home in Philadelphia with other victims in June to present him with petitions from our group. As a result of the inaction of your state government, another company, Jones Harvest Publishing in Bloomington, IN, has set up a second publishing scam and has robbed hundreds of authors of their money. Brien Jones, the owner, was the Executive Vice President of Airleaf who left in 2007 to set up his own scam. You can see that site at www.JonesHarvestFraudVictims.com. This decision by Mr. Morrison only allows crooks like this to keep stealing money from honest and vulnerable people.

We plan to make this a national publicity campaign if we can’t find justice in your state. Please help us. Some of our authors are your constituents, and you owe it to them to fight against this injustice.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at Bonkaye@aol.com or call me at 215-288-6959.

Sincerely,

Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.

Out of the 89 letters I sent, two state reps responded to date telling me that it is not the job of the state senators and representatives to handle this. I guess in Indiana, it isn't anyone's job.

I wrote a letter to my predatory publishing guru, Victoria Strauss, of Writer Beware! asking for her support in having other authors send petitions to express their support of our case. Victoria was very gracious, as always, in printing my letter in her blog yesterday. You can read it here:

Writer Beware Blogs!

I have had six authors respond already stating they will sign petitions to support us. Therefore, I will have a second petition for authors who are not part of our Airleaf group who want to support our cause. When I speak in Connecticut next month about predatory publishing at the CAPA University event, I will ask authors to sign the support petition.

I believe that if we stand up together, we can make a change in this wrongful decision. If we don't stand up, we will be known as "victims" in history. If we fight back, we will be remembered as "victors." We are a group of winners--and we will show this to the government of Indiana.

With love and hope,
Bonnie

INDIANA U.S. ATTORNEY TIMOTHY MORRISON'S REFUSAL TO BRING CRIMINAL CHARGES AGAINST AIRLEAF PUBLISHING

2009-04-04T06:00:00.002-04:00

Dear Airleaf Victims,

I am writing this letter to you in great sadness, disgust, and anger. On Friday afternoon, I received a phone call from our FBI agent who was investigating our case. He felt obligated to call me personally since we have worked so much together over the past year and a half to compile a criminal case against Airleaf Publishing and Carl Lau, the owner. He told me that the U.S. Attorney’s office, headed by Timothy Morrison, has decided not to proceed with our case to bring criminal charges against Airleaf and its owner, Carl Lau. Naturally, I was in shock.

He explained that according to the criminal law statutes in Indiana, the U.S. Attorney’s office did not feel that our case constituted criminal acts. I’m glad I was sitting down when that call came in or else I may have fallen directly to the floor. I told him that this is UNACCEPTABLE. We can account for over 2 million dollars that has been stolen from us—and plenty more from other victims that never found their way to our group. I went over all the fraudulent acts—the never booked cruise that people paid for, the book reviews paid for while the books sat under Carl Lau’s desk, the authors’ royalties that were collected long during and long after Airleaf closed that went into Carl Lau’s private account, the trip to Germany that people paid for while Carl Lau sat in his office playing computer games and telling the staff to tell authors what a successful time he was having, the Lite Stone pretend movie site where authors were told their books were in production or pre-production as movies, and the list went on and on. The FBI agent was on our side. He investigated the case, has piles of files, interviews, computer records, and actual testimony from former employees attesting to the fraudulence. He and the Postal Inspector know we are right, but somehow, Timothy Morrison, the U.S. Attorney can’t equate these actions as criminal.

I told the FBI agent that I am in the process of collecting petitions so I can deliver them myself to Mr. Morrison in Indiana in June. Now, more than ever, we need to speak out and demand justice so we don’t have to remain victims anymore. I want to be able to change our name to the Airleaf Victors rather than the Airleaf Victims.
If you haven’t responded to my request to sign the petition yet, please email me and let me know that you are willing to do this. If you live in or around Indiana and you can go with me, please let me know. I intend to make this a media event to embarrass the government of Indiana into action.

My site www.IndianaWelcomesCrooks.com will be up by next week. I will make sure to send that to the media as well. I will notify you next week when it is up so you can view it.

This is a slap in the face to all hard-working authors who invested hard earned money in a dream that was nothing more than a money-making scheme and con game. It sends a message to the other predatory publishers like Jones Harvest that nothing will happen if they keep stealing money from people. For those of you who live outside the United States in countries including Canada, the UK, Australia, and Scotland, I send a big apology on behalf of our government that allows this fraudulence to go unpunished.

Here is a copy of the email I sent to Mr. Morrison yesterday:

Dear Mr. Morrison,
I was informed by the Indiana FBI today that you will not be following through with our case of fraud against Airleaf Publishing. I want you to know that I and the members of group find this totally unacceptable. I have provided the federal authorities with more than enough evidence proving criminal fraud. We have nearly 600members who are part of our group from the United States and other parts of the world who have been robbed of our money, hopes, dreams, materials, and dignity. There are hundreds of more victims of this company that haven't found their way to us yet. Just within our group, the money stolen is in excess of TWO MILLION DOLLARS. We want justice against Airleaf Publishing and Carl Lau, the owner who not only took our money while he was in business, but continued to steal our royalties after he closed his company for many months to come.

By allowing this crime to go unpunished, you are sending out a message to the other predatory publishers that continue stealing money from unsuspecting authors that it is okay to perpetrate fraud in Indiana without getting punished.

We are committed to finding justice against this fraudulence. I will be coming to visit you in Indiana in June to present you with petitions from our victims with their stories. We will contact every government agency in your state asking them to intercede on our behalf. We will also contact your local media and the national media to bring attention to this injustice. We have been patiently waiting for a year and a half for justice, but now you have decided not to help us find it.

This is a true disgrace, Mr. Morrison.
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.
Organizer, Airleaf Victims

I would appreciate it if you could send an email to Mr. Morrison this week letting him know about your disgust in his refusal to help us. His email address is:
USAINS.Webmaster@usdoj.gov

Tell Mr. Morrison that you are a victim of criminal fraud. I have provided the Indiana government with a ton of information that proves our case. If what happens to us doesn’t constitute fraud in Indiana, then Indiana needs to change its laws. Please take a moment to send Mr. Morrison an email telling him that you do not agree with his decision and request a reversal of his decision. Let him know how violated you feel after being robbed by a company in his state and then feeling doubly victimized by his decision that it is not a crime.

Please send me a note if you do this so I can track how many people have sent a message. It can be a short note just expressing your outrage, or a note stating your story. The important thing is to let him know we want action, not dismissal in this case.

The government of Indiana is counting on our discouragement to make us feel defeated, hoping we will throw up our hands in surrender. They want us to walk away from this issue as some as you have told me to do. A handful of our authors told me to give up—“we can’t win. It’s not worth the fight.” But I don’t agree. I think about the hours, days, months, and years of anguish so many authors went through, and how their lives were forever changed by losing their hard earned savings to a greed and fraudulence. I think of the whole new group of over 70 victims of Brien Jones at Jones Harvest who is now laughing and telling people the government of Indiana doesn’t do anything while he continues to re-victimize many of our original Airleaf victims and a whole new group of unsuspecting authors who fell for his bait. This decision will give him the green light to keep hurting authors.

We need to stand up for ourselves and our dignity. If you have not sent back your response to being part of our petition campaign, please do so AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. To date, I have 72 responses. We need a lot more to make this a cause that won’t be forgotten. Please write to me at Bonkaye@aol.com to let me know you are willing to join our team of Airleaf Victims No More, so we can become Airleaf Victors.

I will have the petition ready by the end of the week and send it out to all of you who are on my list. You will be able to either email it back to me or send it back to me by mail.

Let’s not give up. Thank you for your support and words of encouragement.
With love and hope,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed., Organizer
www.AirleafVictims.com
www.JonesHarvestFraudVictims.com

AIRLEAF VICTIMS/JONES HARVEST VICTIMS UPDATE

2009-03-28T22:37:00.003-04:00

Dear Airleaf Victims,
It has been a while since you’ve heard from me. That’s because I had nothing to tell you. Allow me to explain two issues.

When we began our campaign against Airleaf, we took action on two levels. We applied for civil charges with the Attorney General’s office for restitution of our money. We also filed complaints for criminal charges with the U.S. Attorney’s office for prosecution of criminal actions. In Indiana, those are the two government agencies responsible for each of the actions.

My requests to the U.S. Attorney in Indiana regarding the criminal charges against Carl Lau and Airleaf et. al., have not resulted in any determination as of yet whether they will press charges because the case is under “investigation” by the FBI and Postal authorities as it has been for a year-and-a-half. Quite frankly, I’m stumped. I provided these agencies with all the documentation to make the case, but it’s still being investigated. I am tired of waiting for a response with no communication from Timothy Morrison as of late, the Indiana U.S. Attorney, in spite of asking twice for a decision.
In my frustration, I sent a letter to the U.S. Attorney two weeks ago. This is what it stated:

March 11, 2009

Mr. Kenneth E. Melson, Director
United States Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Room 2242
Washington, DC 20530-0001

Dear Mr. Melson:
My name is Bonnie Kaye. I am the organizer of a group of over 600 people who are victims of a predatory publishing and publicity scam by a now out-of-business company, Airleaf Publishing, in Martinsville, Indiana owned by Carl Lau.
As a victim, in addition to being the organizer of the group, I have spent the past year and a half seeking justice for our very upset members by the Indiana U.S. Attorney’s office. The FBI and the US Postal Authorities have investigated this case for well over a year and a half. I have provided extensive documentation to prove that our case is one of fraudulence as opposed to “poor business practice.”
I was successful in getting this company closed by starting an intensive Internet campaign that shut off the cash flow of the company. At that time, I took two routes—civil charges and criminal charges. I had our authors send out complaint forms to the FBI and Postal Authorities of Indiana for criminal action, as well as the Attorney General of Indiana for civil charges. The Attorney General’s office handed down a judgment against the owner, Carl Lau, last spring, months after the company closed. Unfortunately, since he has no money left, we will not see any kind of restitution. However, we are still seeking retribution in the form of criminal charges so that con men don’t feel entitled to rob authors of thousands of dollars with false promises that will never come true.

From the information that I have been able to gather, Carl Lau stole in excess of two million dollars from unsuspecting authors who have now had their hopes, dreams, and money stolen away from them. How is it that one petty thief can go to jail, but a con man of this magnitude can go free? This makes no sense to any of us.
I have spent hundreds of hours compiling files for the FBI to make our case so that the U.S. Attorney of Indiana, Timothy Morrison, can file criminal charges against the criminal. I have had very little by way of communication in a positive way from Mr. Morrison who seems to just “blow us off.” I am writing to you as a last resort in trying to get us the help and justice we are seeking.

You can read our website at www.AirleafVictims.com. As a result of the inaction of the Indiana government, a second company, Jones Harvest Publishing, owned and operated by the former Executive Vice President of Airleaf, Brien Jones, started operating this scam all over again robbing people of thousands of dollars for fake publicity and publishing campaigns. You can see my site at www.JonesHarvestFraudVictims.com.

Mr. Melson, I know you are very busy, and I am only writing to you in desperation. We don’t know where to turn. Many of our victims are elderly people and disabled people who invested their life savings into this dream that became their nightmare. If action isn’t taken to punish people who do this, it sends up a red flag to other people with no conscience that this kind of fraudulence is not a punishable crime.

Please help us by asking Mr. Morrison to take action against the thieves of Indiana who are robbing people not only in this country, but in internationally as well. It certainly doesn’t make America look good when we allow this type of fraudulence to flourish. If you would like me to send you copies of my correspondence with Mr. Morrison, please let me know.

Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.

I am still waiting for a response from his office. I understand he is busy with AIG, but we have our own personal money woes to contend with due to this fraudulence.
The next step I would like to take is this: I would like to know if you will help me by signing a petition that I will personally deliver in Indiana to the U.S. Attorney’s office with our stories. I will go with Sgt. Don Meyers, Indiana’s most decorated Vietnam War Veteran, as well as an Airleaf Victim, and any other author in the area who is willing to join me. I will call the press ahead of time to announce when I am going, and I will launch my new campaign and website “Indiana Welcomes Crooks” which I am in the process of designing. I’ll send you the link in the next few weeks so you can check it out. I am hoping by taking these measures, I will drum up media interest in our case.

Regardless of the fact that we were able to get the Attorney General’s office to bring a judgment against Carl Lau, we will see nothing. Carl Lau sold his house last year, and the money from Lau’s house went to the IRS for back taxes. He is in debt up the kazoo and supposedly claiming bankruptcy. But don’t feel sorry for him—he’s been collecting unemployment insurance this year. And he and his wife have moved in with his wife’s family. His wife has an excellent job, so they are not suffering, but a lot of us sure are.

If you are willing to help me with this petition campaign, please send me an email at Bonkaye@aol.com and let me know I can count on you. I’m willing to donate my time and money to go to Indiana on your behalf. All I’m asking you for is sign a statement that I will send to you requesting that the U.S. Attorney bring charges against Airleaf for crimes against our authors.

In the meantime, I am working with nearly 70 victims of Jones Harvest Publishing owned by Brien Jones. I have them filing reports to the Attorney General’s office in Indiana. When so many of you told me initially that Brien Jones was the real criminal at Airleaf, I couldn’t understand why. After all, he didn’t own the company. But of course I’ve learned the hard way that he was the one who came up with most of the fraudulent schemes and talked you out of your money as you kept telling me. He’s done this all over again on his own. Many of our victims have been re-victimized, and I will keep fighting on their behalf as well as his new victims who have found me due to my Google Advertising on the Jones Harvest page of Google. Feel free to check it out. We have to let the government of Indiana know that we will not tolerate their lack of action against predatory publishing fraud.

Three other items before I end.
1.Airleaf Victim Tom Barnes called me the other day and told me that if you have lost money with Airleaf, you can file it as a fraudulence loss on your income tax this year. Even if it happened two or three years ago, we didn’t know about the fraudulence until 2008. I took mine off my taxes last year. If you haven’t done that yet, please think about adding it to your return.

2.Keep in mind our Books of Excellence author’s co-op. Please check it out if you haven’t seen it lately at www.BooksOfExcellence.com. We have some wonderful authors, and books are selling and being promoted. We would be happy to have you join our group. Please email me if you would like further information.

3.I’ll be in Connecticut in May at the CAPA conference (Connecticut Authors and Publishing Association) as a guest speaker on Predatory Publishing discussing how we as victims stood up to fight and stop Airleaf. If any of you live in the area, I’d love to meet you. Please let me know if you’d like more information.

Thank you for your patience, support, and hopefully, willingness to keep our battle alive until we see justice. What happened to us is criminal—and criminals need to be punished.

Love,
Bonnie Kaye, M. Ed.

HORAY FOR HOLLYWOOD

2009-02-03T22:33:00.005-05:00

Hooray for Hollywood

Well, Hollywood is revving up for the Indiana Jones family. They are going to Hollywood one more time to give vulnerable authors false hopes that a blockbuster movie could be made from one of their books if they are willing to shell out hundreds of dollars. Usually on these trips, they pack up the family as you can see on the website under the ‘Hollywood” button. It’s sort of like the Clampetts do Hollywood. There’s Brien and Brandy, Brien’s mom, cousin, and daughter. Well, at least it’s a family affair, although I hesitate in using the term “affair” loosely when I speak of Brien and Hollywood.

Anyway, this year’s offer is different than last year’s. Last year, the letter started with “Hollywood For Real.” It stated that “no one is making a movie out of one of our books—not yet. However, we have made three trips to Hollywood and we are closer than any other self publisher has ever been.” Now that’s really remarkable, I must say. I say that because it is now a year later and they are still no closer now than they were a year ago to getting anyone’s book turned into a movie. Even though I was assured by the author of “Rock with Rodney and Party with Perky” that Brien Jones had found four producers interested in her movies, so far, not one taker. Perhaps that’s why the “revised version” of the book has been “under production” for the past five months on his website because it’s now been extended to add a new concept on the cover: Bush’s anti-environmental report. When the author told me about the four productions companies that Jones had interested last summer, I checked them on the Internet and didn’t have any luck in finding them. Me of little faith, right? So then I called the man who is the organizer of the event and asked him if those companies attended, and he said he never heard of them either. When I reported the findings back to the author in hopes that she would wake up to the scam, she blasted me by posting on Brien’s blog that she spoke to the companies herself. That was different than her original story of telling me that Brien Jones gave her the name of the companies. But you know how it goes in Hollywood—fiction is always a big hit.

In last year’s offer, authors were promised that they would have their book, as well as their picture, featured on a site called “booktopictures.com.” When I checked out that website, it didn’t exist; however, it did redirect me to a site called “bootypictures.com.” All of this was available for “just $350.00.” But there was so much more! For a mere $500.00 additional dollars, they were willing to submit your book to one of two Hollywood producers and provide you with a resume and contact information for both executives. I think those of us who survived the Airleaf scandal will remember the kinds of producers the books were submitted to. They ranged from companies like Litestone Entertainment headed by Al Smith which lied about producing 30 books into movies, including his trailer that never became a book “Jessie’s Girl” to a company called Cinemagic which magically disappeared back to Japan. Ask me if I believe that there are not hundreds of scam artist producers waiting in Hollywood for vulnerable authors to shell out money. I’ve already spoken to half a dozen of them while fighting for our author victims. Anyway, that deal must have gone sour because it’s not even being offered this year.

And now Jones Harvest is offering to turn authors’ books into screenplays for free. One of my Airleaf author victims said Brien called her and offered to turn her book into a screenplay for free. This way it might sell better to the film people.

Remarkably, hundreds of emails went out to our Airleaf victims this past week from Jones Harvest offering to sell their books for free. In this letter, Jones states:

No charge, no obligation. No strings attached. I'll put the book on our websites today and even make a few calls. If you send me books, I’ll try to put them in stores. (Again, no charge, no obligation.)

All you have to do is send me a copy or copies of your book or email me the cover. I worked at Airleaf Publishing through 2006, (they closed in 2008) and I just want to help out if I can.
http://www.myauthorspace.com/

http://www.jonesharvest.com/

http://www.starredreview.com/

http://www.authorgifts.com/

http://www.bookwheat.com/

http://www.myauthorprofile.com/

http://www.brienjones.com/

He did manage to leave out some of his other untraveled sites like Great Concept Books, Bargain Basement Books (doesn’t that sound uplifting?), Author Soldier, and his two Christian sites, Perfect Heart and Chosen Few. I keep reminding people that the only one who views those sites is me—trying to reach unsuspecting authors of the outrageous scam they are part of for thousands of dollars.

This short statement in itself was a lie. Brien was trying to put a two-year wedge between his leaving Airleaf and the close of Airleaf. Jones left in the beginning of 2007, and Airleaf closed 11 months later in December of 2007. Actually it was the same year. But that’s Brien Jones—trying to mislead the public again.

I sent out a email blast to my list of over 500 Airleaf victims warning them about working with the King of Con. To say the Brien Jones doesn’t do anything for free is truly an understatement. Brien Jones doesn’t do much for people who pay him thousands of dollars. Look at all the authors that paid him money to be featured in a color catalogue to be given out at the book fairs. There was no catalogue. And when they asked him back for their money, he told them that he doesn’t have money. And why doesn’t he have money? Not because he can’t keep fooling the same victims who were taken once or twice because they realize that they are donating to the Jones family charity and want to redirect their contributions. Not because he screwed so many printers that they won’t print for him anymore. Not because his production and sales crew quit because of his fraudulence. Not because people don’t get their books after waiting for a year or two or have to send back galley after galley. No—he’s broke because of Bonnie Kaye. He can’t afford to publish his books but he can afford to pay for a website called “Bonnie Kaye Lies” where he puts his blog letters of support from five or six authors on there along with his own commentaries libeling me.

But what he forgets is that I am doing this work out of a mission to protect our authors who put their money, hopes, and dreams into a con game, not because I make any money. I have never accepted a dime from an author even though many have offered to support my efforts. He can’t hurt me. I don’t offer anything but the truth and help to authors. On the other hand, I am hurting him by telling the truth. This is why I now have 63 verified complaints about the tens of thousands of dollars that authors have lost and will never see again. You see, in the end, the truth speaks for itself. When authors receive royalty checks once a year for $1.35 or $6.25 after investing so much money, they know that what I speak is the truth. It doesn’t matter how many of the Jones Harvest websites these authors are featured on—no one is looking except me as I mentioned earlier.

Lee Goldberg, the renowned author and columnist, stated in a blog last week written by Victoria Strauss, my predatory publishing guru, about the Hollywood scam that his gardener has more contacts with Hollywood executives than Brien Jones because at least he mows the lawns for some of them. If you want to shell out money, maybe we can ask the gardener to drop off your book while he’s at one of these jobs. He is actually closer to them than the Jones Harvest family will ever be.

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE PREDATORY SCAMS

2008-09-07T13:26:00.001-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE SEPTEMBER 7, 2008
Dear Fellow Airleaf Victims and Friends,
Next Sunday is the annual Brooklyn Book Fair in Brooklyn, New York. I am excited about attending the event so I can promote our new co-op, Books Of Excellence. If any of you are in the New York area and would like to meet up with me, please email me at Bonkaye@aol.com and I’ll make arrangements to meet you. We are constantly adding new members to our co-op, so if you haven’t had a chance to look at it lately, check us out at www.BooksOfExcellence.com.
I have been in touch with the U.S. Attorney in Indiana to see how our criminal case is coming along. I have been assured that the investigation is still being worked on and conversations by investigators taken place. I am hoping to have more information for you within the next several weeks.
I would like to take some time to talk about members of our group becoming VICTIMS all over again. This week, I have been working with five of our victims to help them with publishing and publicity scams where once again they have been taken for large sums of money. Omni Publicity, owned by Joe Ullrich in Tampa, Florida, promised one of our authors this deal:
PROPOSED CAMPAIGN
Research & Development
Omni Experts Online Directory Listing (1 year – a $399.00 value)
Press Release Creation
Broadcast (Online) Press Release Distribution
Direct Email
Aggressive Marketing
Twelve (12) Talk Radio Interviews
Any additional Interviews are no charge
Total Investment: $ 2395.00
And then came the GUARANTEE--
OMNI PUBLICITY AND PUBLIC RELATIONS GROUP GUARANTEE

Omni Publicity And Public Relations Group placements are no risk to you!
You only pay for the interviews you receive…period!
We assume all the financial risk! The professional staff of Omni Publicity And Public Relations Group will aggressively market you to talk radio shows throughout the country. Our efforts will yield the desired results of interviews – and you only pay for the interviews you receive!
We strongly recommend this campaign to you with complete confidence as it has been so successful for so many of our other clients. This exact campaign has secured interviews for our authors on a national, regional and local level. Some of our authors have also appeared on national TV as well as in print - most notability Dr. Phil, A Current Affair, Geraldo, FOX News Channel, NPR radio, The Miami Herald and GLOBE to name just a mere few – as a direct result of this campaign! The rates within are guaranteed for 30 days from the date of this proposal!
Our author fell for these smooth talking promises. This happened two years ago, and there was never one interview. When I called the Joe Ullrich on the victim’s behalf, explaining I was the leader of a predatory publishing/publicity group, he was very defensive telling me that the author was “crazy.” Often, disgruntled authors are classified as “crazy” by predatory publishers when they express their dissatisfaction. Good comeback, huh?
Anyway, I told the owner that he promised services that were never received, and that I have emails between the two parties where he offers a lot of “excuses” but no action. He claimed that he sent out emails to the media. When I asked him who the media was, he replied, “We can’t reveal that list.” When I asked him who he personally called as he guaranteed, again, “I don’t give out that information.” Okay, what information do you give out? That’s when the phone slammed in my ear. No doubt there may be authors who are happy with Mr. Ullrich, but that’s irrelevant to our author victim who received NOTHING that she was promised.
The “EXCUSES” need to be a RED FLAG to those of you who are currently paying for services that aren’t being delivered or paying for services that are free like book reviews from Barnes and Noble and Midwest. So now, I will be making a case through the Florida law enforcement agencies to help our victim get her money back.
Another one of our victims recently paid for a “Hollywood Dream” scheme in Atlanta, Georgia. The company, Jigsaw Filmwork, owned by a Timothy Crenshaw, promised her to put together a package for a Hollywood deal. He convinced her that there were investors ready to pay for the production, and the famous key gripper turned producer, Courtney Jones, would produce her movie. If you go on the Jigsaw Filmwork website at the following address, http://jigsawfilmworks-llc.com/mainmenu.html, you can see Mr. Jones as part of the staff. Is he? No clue. I just know this author was scammed. She paid the money, and waited and waited for a production package to be presented to her. In fact, she was supposed to be flown to “Hollywood” next week to meet with the production crew. They even had the nerve to have her make a list of who she would like to star in the movie. And even better—this company was found on the same website as Carl Lau, Go Big Network, looking for an investor. Here’s his profile that I found:
Timothy Crenshaw

Company: Jigsaw Filmworks
Industry: Entertainment
Location: Atlanta, GA (USA)
My Focus: Startup;

Startup Company Profile
Startup Name Jigsaw Filmworks
Location Atlanta, GA (United States)
Industry Entertainment
Year Founded 2007
Legal Status Unspecified
Business Stage Unspecified
Number of Employees Unspecified
Company Description We are an independent film company that produces films for the big screen, television and video releases. Timothy Crenshaw(Jigsaw Filmsorks) has been in the Entertainment field for 15 years working with artists such as JaRule, 112,Black Reign to name a few in the recording field. Now that he has moved over to the motion pictures industry business he has the pleasure of teaming with well know director/producer Courtney Jones based out of California.Courtney Jones has been involved with several motion pictures such as Star Wars, The Bratz, Fronterz plus many others.
Somehow, Mr. Crenshaw has come down with some rare illness called, “Don’t look for me after I get your money, ” and has failed to deliver the goods. I think he would be an excellent partner for Carl Lau or maybe Litestone Entertainment, don’t you?
As of late, some of you know I have been working with our victims who have become victims once again through Jones Harvest Publishing. To address this problem, I put up another website at www.JonesHarvestFraudVictims.com. I felt compelled to do this at the point when I had over a dozen new victims of this company. Jones Harvest has rallied their select fans to attack me for exposing them, but I stand by my claims that people are being defrauded through this company. At first, people were able to get their money back through threats, but now that has changed, no matter how much they “guarantee” your satisfaction or giving your money back. Well, actually, on their website, they make that guarantee to…“all new clients a money-back guarantee on our publishing, promotional and bookselling services.” Hmmm, what about their old clients who are asking for their money back?
Fans of Jones Harvest (3 to be exact) have written to me directly or via blogs to state that they are thrilled with the services from the company. And for those authors, I am thrilled for them. Remember—Airleaf had clients who loved them also. I wasn’t fighting for the ones who loved the company—I was fighting for those of us who were victims of the company.
When Brien Jones left Airleaf and started his own company, he promised that he would be “different.” He frowned on all of those schemes that made people have dreams that would never come true—or so he said. He only wanted to “sell books.” For that reason, I gave him a chance. I never knew him at Airleaf and he offered to republish my Airleaf book for free in return for allowing him to post my picture on one of his numerous websites, Author Celebrity. Jones also claims that I “forced” him to publish 40 other books for free in various emails he has sent to authors attacking me. Truth be told, I only asked him to publish one book for free—the book of Jason Hubal’s who was a disabled young man near death’s door. Jason and his mom, Gracie, invested $8,000.00 at Airleaf for nothing, and Jason was hoping to see his book before he passed on. I told Brien Jones it would be the right thing to do—and he did it. This was the only book I personally requested that he reprint for free.
Although numerous members of our group complained to me about Jones, I told you that we had to focus our campaign on Carl Lau because he was the owner of the company. When I would tell Brien about the complaints, he would always tell me that he was just a worker—in fact a victim too—of Airleaf. He wasn’t even allowed to open the mail. Whatever. In reality, he was the Vice President. He was the one who came up with the schemes. If you look at his promotions now—as many of you do and send them to me—it’s the same promotions as he did at Airleaf. And the promises:
• Weekly calls with progress reports
• Calls to every newspaper, magazine, and radio station in her hometown with a report
• One television appearance including a DVD version
• Three radio interviews including one on a nationally syndicated AM/FM radio show
• Submission of your book to a film producer for review and recommendations
And best of all, Jones Harvest states in their agreement: Each of these commitments is guaranteed. We will not be satisfied until we place your book in bookstores everywhere and you are a celebrity.
Does this sound all too familiar? Well, it’s déjà vu all over again for too many people.
I spoke to an author this week whose books were turned in over a YEAR ago—along with her money--to Jones Harvest and they are still not out or even corrected with galleys. EXCUSES, EXCUSES, EXCUSES are all she is receiving.
Wake up authors—there are no excuses for taking a year to put out a book. My publisher, CCB Publishing (www.CCBPublishing.com) does it in a month—4 weeks--and so does Bob Denton from Mountain Valley Publishing (www.MountainValleyPublishing.com). Both of them provide excellent publishing and distribution services and get your book out for a reasonable amount of money quickly and with integrity. Read the testimonials on their website and see for yourself.
As for the Better Business Bureau rating of Jones Harvest let me say this—when over 50 of our victims sent in complaints to the Indiana BBB about Airleaf, and just weeks prior to the shut down, the BBB was still giving Airleaf a positive rating. I called them a few weeks ago and asked how that happens. The woman explained to me that changing a rating takes time—it could even take more than a year. First, the BBB has to do an investigation which can take months. So, just because someone buys membership into the BBB and pays for the top of the line rating doesn’t mean a thing. Trust me when I tell you the BBB has complaints about Jones Harvest. I know. And so does the Attorney General and U.S. Attorney’s office.
The irony here is that I am being blamed for the future collapse of Jones Harvest. Once again, am I to blame that authors don’t get what they’re promised or pay for? Am I the culprit when people are being misled and lied to? I don’t think so. Quite frankly, I would have been very happy to end my predatory activism days with Airleaf. But too many of you are like my extended family. I will devote my time to any of you who are being burned again. That’s what family is about.
I felt the need to write about this now so that in the future, authors won’t come to me and say why didn’t I warn them earlier. I already feel bad that I’ve kept quiet too long in hopes of things changing for the better. Don’t allow yourselves to fall prey to savvy sales con men who promise you outrageous promises that can’t come true. Always do a thorough check first—or write to me and I’ll do a thorough check for you.
If you have any other companies you would like me to check for you, please write to me any time. Don’t allow yourself to be a victim AGAIN!
Love, Bonnie Kaye

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE AUGUST 23, 2008

2008-08-23T06:01:00.001-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE AUGUST 23, 2008

Dear Authors and Friends,
I wanted to send you an update to let you know that I am still diligently working on our case. I am in touch with the Attorney General’s office through our representative Tom Irons. The case against Airleaf was filed in civil court several months ago when I wrote to you about the judgment. This is still in the early phases of being resolved. Most likely, Carl Lau will be declaring bankruptcy; however—we do have a chance that this will NOT happen based on some information I obtained this week.
On the website Go Big Network, a website that tries to hook people up with investors, I found this advertisement:
Carl Lau

Company: 2nd Century Films
Industry: Entertainment
Location: Greenwood, IN (USA)
My Focus: Startup;

Startup Company Profile
Startup Name 2nd Century Films
Location Greenwood, IN (United States)
Industry Entertainment
Year Founded 2008
Legal Status Unspecified
Business Stage Unspecified
Number of Employees Unspecified
Company Description A startup company with lots of projects to put into movies, Hollywood likes the screenplays and we have the right actors and directors to produce. Great investment for the long term or short term investor.

It also said Carl is looking for:
Entertainment $1,000,000.00

I found this very amusing. One million dollars to start his own film company—amazing! Well, I can always hope that he’s planning to use that money to pay for the judgment against him by the Attorney General’s office.
It seems that Carl Lau has no shame. After scamming hundreds of us, he’s looking to find new victims. I was happy to forward this information to the authorities who are investigating our case. I wanted them to know that sleeping dogs don’t seem to lie—or rather—lay still for very long.
I am staying in touch with the United States Attorney’s office in Indiana, as well as the FBI to keep pushing them for help. As soon as a decision is made, I will notify you and let you know next steps. This week marks one year since I started our Airleaf Victims group. We’ve made excellent progress in view of the obstacles that have been placed in our way. We must remain vigilant and not give up!
Here’s some very exciting news for our authors. I am always looking for ways for authors to boost their books. I looked into book reviews because some of our authors feel that having a book review will help with their book promotions.
I was excited to find that Barnes and Noble on line does FREE book reviews without charging authors. To make doubly sure, I wrote to them directly. Here was their response:
Thanks for your interest in the Barnes & Noble Review.
Publishers, authors, or publicists interested in having a published or forthcoming book considered for review by the Barnes & Noble Review can mail a galley/advance reading copy or finished copy of the book, along with a cover letter including appropriate contact information, to:
Deirdre Sonsini The Barnes & Noble Review
Barnes & Noble.com 76 Ninth Avenue
New York, NY 10011
Best wishes,
The Barnes and Noble Review
Just to be sure, I wrote to Barnes and Noble to double check if there is any charge at all for this review and the answer was NO!!
Another excellent source of FREE book reviews is Midwest Book Reviews. You can visit their website at http://www.midwestbookreview.com/bookbiz/url_sub.htm
There is great information on there about publicizing your book as well. Directions on how to subject your book for a review is also found there.

In September, I will officially be launching our author’s co-op Books of Excellence. If you haven’t seen our site lately, please check it out at www.BooksOfExcellence.com. We are happy to have any of our Airleaf Victims join the group. We will be promoting it at an upcoming book fair in New York in a few weeks. I have started Google advertising for the site, and our members have started buying books of other members in support. If you would like to join this innovative group, please drop me a note and I will send you the details.

Remember, as you pursue your republishing or promotional futures, make sure NOT to repeat the mistakes of your past. Thoroughly investigate any publisher who offers you anything beyond publishing your book. If a publisher is charging you money for a review, please let me know and I will check it out for you to find out if there really is a cost for the review. Also make sure that you have a signed contract. Many of our Airleaf Victims never received back a signed contract. No matter how “friendly” you are with your publisher, business is business. Also make sure you receive quarterly statements which is standard and promised. And if you buy a promotional package, make sure to ask for a regular accounting of where your book is being sold. For instance, one woman wrote to me recently to tell me that she was told by her publisher that her book is in 33 bookstores. When I questioned her about where these stores are, I couldn’t get a response. Make sure you find out the bookstore and call them to verify this information. And if you are told that your book is being solicited to all of your area media, ask for a list of the media and who was spoken to. Learn from your marketing mistakes of the past. Don’t allow yourself to be a victim again like a number of the Airleaf Victims who have come to me a second time. And if you feel you have been cheated by any book company, please let me know so I can help you retrieve your money.

Several of our authors have recently asked me about the credibility of the Better Business Bureau. In checking out a reliable publisher, don’t assume that you will get a reliable rating from the Better Business Bureau because of the long and difficult process involved. One of our victims recently tried to file a report on line, only to be frustrated because the site froze when she tried to submit it. When I tried to help her with the form, it froze on me as well. In frustration, I called the Indiana Better Business Bureau and explained my frustration. I also asked them what it takes on their part to remove a company that less than reputable from their list. I explained that so many of our Airleaf Victims complained to the Indiana Better Business Bureau, but yet Airleaf remained in good standing with them until the end. They explained that it is a long process to do an investigation on a company once they are a dues paying member. There are a number of steps that have to be taken, and this takes time. They were able to send me the form via email to be printed out and done manually, so that was a help. But as I’m watching the process of this specific complaint, I see the company in question has sent back a response which isn’t responding to the complaint. This means more time and more correspondence and more delays. It becomes a “he said—she said” ordeal with lots of delays. So it’s certainly possible for a company to keep that BBB Accreditation for a long time regardless if their reliability. This is why so many of us were misled by the Better Business Bureau when we checked out Airleaf in the past.

Bottom line—investigate, investigate, investigate before you make your next mistake!
I’m happy to check out any company that you are considering for feedback. Just send me a note.

I will be in touch soon. Please feel free to write to me for help with anything you need or any questions you have.

With love and hope,
Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE JUNE 28, 2008

2008-06-29T06:08:00.003-04:00

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

I have had the wonderful opportunity to meet nearly five hundred of you via email, telephone, mail, and in-person visits. I feel as if you are my extended family because we've shared so much together. Some of us will remain lifetime friends long after Airleaf is behind us.

It has been nearly a year since I started my campaign to stop the fraudulence at Airleaf. In this past year, together we have done what people said was impossible—namely put Airleaf out of business and have charges brought by the Indiana Attorney General's office all within this relatively short time period. I have no doubt that other charges will be brought on the criminal end even though things are not moving as quickly.

For the past 10 months, I have sent out my updates on a weekly basis to expose the fraudulence that went on at Airleaf as well as to give important information about republishing your work. Recently, I exposed similar Airleaf-type fraudulence going on at Jones Harvest Publishing. Brien Jones has sent out notes asking people why I am doing this to him. All I am doing is alerting people to the marketing fraud that Brien is repeating at his own company in the same contemptuous way he did at Airleaf.

I would like to tell you something of my past relationship with Brien. When I started my group of Airleaf Victims, a number of people believed and accused me of working with Brien Jones to start the group. They thought he was using me to get back at Airleaf and Carl Lau. Although Brien was very helpful in giving me information about Airleaf, as were other former employees, he was certainly not responsible for my actions. In fact, he was not in favor of them and discouraged me from starting the Airleaf Victims campaign. He still felt some sense of loyalty to Lau or perhaps it was fear of repercussions to him if Lau suspected Jones of working with me.

Many of you wrote to me in the early days when I started my campaign that Brien was the person you held responsible for the loss of your money. I tried to "redirect" your anger against Carl Lau because he was ultimately the person responsible for not providing the services and taking the money into the Airleaf bank account.

From our first conversation, Brien swore to me that he was going to be different than Airleaf. He only wanted to sell books. He said his goal was to travel from bookstore to bookstore asking them to take books because authors want their books in bookstores. In the beginning of his business, he told me that the Hollywood pitches were a waste of time and knocked Airleaf for doing that. He promised me that every promise he made to authors would be kept. HE WAS DIFFERENT THAN CARL LAU AND AIRLEAF. And guess what? I believed him. Because I believed him, I allowed him to use me to gather other authors for his business. That would have been fine if he was doing an honest job. But he wasn't—and he isn't. So many of our authors told me horror stories about Brien, and in time, it became impossible to overlook them. He had an excellent explanation for every accusation, but could so many people be wrong? Now I realize I was naïve and trusting even after being stung. So if it happened to you TWICE, know that you're not alone. But guess what? It won't happen to me ever again. I've learned to be smarter.

Since exposing the fraudulence of Jones Harvest three weeks ago, two people have written to me to tell me that they are happy with Brien Jones and Jones Harvest Publishing. I'm glad to hear that. But I've explained to these authors that there were people who were very happy with Airleaf as well; however, that didn't mean the majority of us weren't victims of predatory publishing. Brien makes promises in writing that he is not keeping nor does he have any intention of keeping. Even stamping that a book is has a copyright when there is no copyright is a blatant slap in the face of every author when that happens. Promising people fame when there is no fame to be had is repeating the same scam as Airleaf did. As so many of you have written to me over the past six months, you can no longer tell the difference between the Jones Harvest ads and the Airleaf ads. This is sickening for sure.

The lesson to be learned from our tragedy with Airleaf is not to make the same mistake twice—or in some of our cases, three times. And, if you made the mistake a second time, you can fix it. Make sure that you have a signed contract in hand from whomever your new publisher is. Make sure you get statements and payments as you were promised. Write down on your calendar the quarterly dates they are do. When you go to a publisher, have him put INTO writing what you can expect to make with the sale of your book. Seeing the profit margin may drive you to keep checking out other possible solutions. Do research on Google. Put in the name of the company and put Complaints about…. And see what comes up. You learn a whole lot that way. And then check with others who have used the company. Check with me! I'll research it for you and let you know what I find out. I have friends now in the predatory publishing world—thank you Victoria, Anne, and Dave! You are all guardian angels of our vulnerable and believing authors. Check out their Preditors and Editors and Writers Beware columns. Learn how to be a good detective before falling for promises that will be broken.

At this point, you will stop receiving the Airleaf Victims update on a weekly basis. I will send you all a blitz whenever there is news on the case. If I need help in getting results, I will write to all of you for your help. I am trying to refocus myself into positive action such as our Books of Excellence Author Co-op and exposing other predatory publishing to make sure victims have a platform.

If you need help in anything and want my help, don't hesitate to write to me. Otherwise, you'll hear from me on an informational basis only. I will let all of you know once our site for the authors' co-op is up and functioning. We will be very proud to accomplish this to show the world that our books will continue to be seen and read.

Incidentally, if you have the WE Entertainment channel on your cable (Women's Entertainment), you can see me in an episode of Secret Lives of Women being rebroadcast on July 1st at 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. You can also catch it on July 4th at 8 p.m. and 4:00 a.m. The episode is "Dirty Little Secrets of Suburban Housewives." It is certainly quite a shocking hour not for the faint of heart—or those under aged! I'm in the segment with the woman who has a gay husband. They interviewed me doing a counseling session with the woman. It's on the second part of the show.

Love to all of my victim fighters who helped make history happen. Better days are ahead.

With love and hope,

Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE JUNE 21, 2008

2008-06-21T16:23:00.002-04:00

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

There is no new news for this week concerning Airleaf. I should hopefully have some new news by next week, so please hang in.

Our book co-op is moving along nicely. I'll be meeting with the web designer on Monday. I have changed the name of the group at the suggestion of one of our members, Jim Akenhead. Instead of Authors New Start, I have taken out the new domain name of www.BooksOfExcellence.com, and we will be known as the Books of Excellence Author's Co-op. I think the name says it all! It will also be savvier for advertising purposes of the group. If you want to join the co-op, there are still a few spots left. Email me at Bonkaye@aol.com and I'll send you information. For those members who are enrolled in the group, I will send you an email by Tuesday after I meet with the web designer on Monday.

In moving ahead, I would like to reiterate about some of the lessons learned from the Airleaf experience. There's a saying, "Those who do not learn from the past are bound to repeat the same mistakes in the future." I see that happening to many of our victims who are re-victimized again.

If you have re-published since Airleaf, make sure you receive quarterly notifications about your sales and royalties. A publishing company should make sure you get a statement and/or check on a quarterly basis. I have had a number of people who engaged in book deals nearly a year ago who have received one or no statements. This is a red flag of a problem.

Also, before you re-print or publish again, talk to the company so you will fully understand what your profit will be for every book sold. There is so much confusion surrounding this issue which inevitably leads to author disappointment. For instance, some publishers tell authors they will earn a 50% split on profits, but the key word here is "profit." First ask what the printing cost will be because that's the first number deducted from your "profit." Then take into account that if your book is sold on outlets such as Amazon or Barnes and Noble, there is a 55% discount. This is why authors can end up with a dollar or less per sale after splitting the "profits." If you are paying $1,250.00 or more to get your book in print, that means you have to sell over 1000 copies just to break even on your outlay of money. This is why so many authors are so disappointed when they realize the reality of POD publishing.

Even if you sell a book and receive an advance, it could be a long time before you see any additional money. My first book was sold traditionally, and I received an advance of $2,000.00. I had a literary agent for the book who receives 25% as a commission from every sale I made, including the upfront money. That meant my advance was $1,500.00. It took me three years to start earning new money because of how little I made on the sale of each book.

Please keep in mind that the price of promotions should be weighed against the sales of your book. In other words, if you pay $750.00 to have your books displayed in book festivals, and even 20 of them sell (which is highly unlikely), you are looking at a possible profit of $80.00 against your investment of $750.00. You would definitely do better investing your money with a legitimate publicist who can spend 20 hours just working on your book setting up book signings, newspaper interviews, radio shows in your city, or even taking out ads in local papers to promote your book.

When you are negotiating with a new publisher, DO YOUR HOMEWORK THOROUGHLY! Do comparative shopping. There are so many inconsistencies from publisher to publisher of what you are getting for your money. Check and see what the cost of printing will be before you set your price for the book. If your printing cost is too high and your sale price is too low, you could be losing money on your sales.

Make sure before you go with a company you have a SIGNED CONTRACT. How many of us never had a signed contract with Airleaf? How many of you have gone with companies and still don't have a signed contract? If you don't get a signed contract, it will be harder to get what's due to you if you have to go to court. If you have republished and have not received a signed contract, call your publisher on Monday and ask to receive one.

In your contract, make sure you see it clearly stated how often you can expect royalties and statements. If you don't, it's left to the publisher to decide. Some people are told they will only receive payment once a year. Make sure you clearly understand what to expect time wise and money wise.

I have seen some publishers say that they will never keep your money for books sold when they charge you a very large fee upfront. They say you can keep all of the profits after the printing costs. But they will charge you 20% - 25% more for printing charges which is where they also make their money. Check with at least 3 companies to see what the printing charge would be for your book.

Check your credit card bills. A number of our victims have written to me about monies that were taken from their credit cards without authorization. One slimy publisher told his customer that he would make it up to her in printed books. There is never an excuse for anyone to use your credit card UNLESS YOU APPROVE IT FIRST!

If a publisher uses your credit card without your permission, this is grounds for criminal charges.

Research the company you want to use on the Internet. Go to websites like Writers Beware! or Preditors & Editors to see if the company you want to use is listed. Also when you type in the name of a company into a search engine, type in, "Critics of Airleaf Publishing" or whatever the name of the company is. You will surely find some revealing information before you walk into a trap again in almost all cases. If there is any doubt or concern, CHECK WITH ME FIRST. I don't have all of the answers for sure, but I am happy to research it for you and call on my predatory publishing experts.

Learn how to do inexpensive marketing yourself. No one can sell your book as well as you can sell it! Get an inexpensive webpage, have cards made up, pass them out to everyone, everywhere. I have a place on line that makes up 250 beautiful cards for $10.00. If you want to use this service, let me know and I'll forward you the information. Call your local newspapers. Tell them that you are a local author and you have a book that has recently been released.

For those of you who have been successful doing your own marketing, please send me some ideas to share with everyone else. Also, if you feel that something didn't work for you, share that as well.

Also, until a book promoted by publishers taking books to Hollywood is actually being turned into a movie, stop throwing your money away for a company to take your book there. Let's learn from the Airleaf tragedy—Hollywood is NOT waiting for our books. Don't be sucked in by the glitz and glamour of fame by predators that want to take and use your money for themselves.

Have a good week!

With love and hope,

Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE JUNE 14, 2008

2008-06-14T15:14:00.001-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE JUNE 14, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

This will be a short but important update. Last Saturday, Indiana was hit by some of the most horrific storms in its history. One of the towns ravaged by the flooding was Martinsville. More specifically, the Airleaf building was totally flooded out. Every remaining book stored there was destroyed as well as all other files including disks and other items you may have sent there. The building itself was under at least four to five feet of water throughout the facility.

The Airleaf flood will bring many new questions to light. Did Carl Lau have flood insurance? If he did, will he be reimbursed for all of the tens of thousands of books that were there? If he didn't, will this force him into greater financial stress pushing him into bankruptcy? We don't have the answers to those questions, but I hope to find them out as the weeks progress.

A number of our victims were fortunate to recover their property over the past six months thanks to Bob Denton, now owner of Mountain Valley Publishing Company. I asked Bob if he would be willing to help our authors get back their books and materials stored in the building, and he was extremely responsive. I have received dozens of letters from you, our victims, about Bob's helpfulness and courteousness in helping you with this task without charging any money for his own time—only for the cost of postage.

Although I was not very nice about Bob in my early updates because of Airleaf and his connection there until nearly the end, I do believe that he truly feels very bad for all of the authors who were fraudulently taken by Airleaf and has tried to make up for that. I have heard very positive feedback from some of our victims who republished with Bob concerning his timeliness, excellent customer service, and professionalism in getting a job done and their books into print.

But most importantly, we owe Bob thanks because he worked tirelessly in filling those requests from numerous victims who asked for his help in retrieving materials back from Airleaf. He tried to get to everyone who came to him, and he did get many of you back your valuable belongings. For the others who were not as fortunate, whatever was at Airleaf is now gone.

As you all know by now, I'm the first to pull a punch where it needs to be pulled. If someone is taking advantage of our authors like I reported about Brien Jones of Jones Harvest was last week, I will do everything to expose it to you.

And talking about Jones Harvest, in this week's Writer's Beware, my predatory publishing guru, Victoria Strauss, followed up on my Jones Harvest expose from last week in her own column and added some additional information that you may like to read. Here is the link to Victoria's column.

Link:

Writer Beware Blogs!

Thank you, Victoria, for working endlessly to expose the predatory leeches in our midst. You and Anne Crispin make this a safer world for unsuspecting authors.

I'd like to also mention that Fideli Publishing Company, owned by Robin Surface and staffed by ex-Airleaf employees (who left there due to the fraudulence), was also destroyed in the flood. Robin and her staff have worked diligently with some Airleaf victims to put their books into print and to return books that were left at Airleaf. They are now trying to put life back together for the company. We wish Fideli good luck in getting restarted.

On a positive note, our authors' co-op is moving along nicely. If you have signed up to be part of this new, exciting venture, you will be hearing from me this week as we finalize our plans to get started. If you did not notify me yet and would like to be part of our group, Authors New Start, there is still time. Just email me at Bonkaye@aol.com. We have nearly 50 people which was my start-up goal. The group will be limited to 100 members.

That's the news for this week.

With love and hope,

Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update June 7, 2008

2008-06-07T17:04:00.003-04:00

Airleaf Victims Update June 7, 2008
Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,
Our numbers have now reached over 450 members. Welcome to the new members of our group.
We had a positive response to our Authors New Start Co-op group this week. So far, in our first week, we have 28 people ready to go. I will give this one more week in hopes of getting our targeted 50 members, but we can always add new members when people want to join who are part of our group.
Once again, the cost to join will be $50.00 for the first year, and $25.00 a year after that. For that money, you will get one book of your choice on the front page of the website and then a full page about you and your book or other books. If you need to make changes to the site such as adding books, there will be a minimal charge. In addition, members have to commit to buy five (5) books per year from other authors who are members of the co-op. These books can be used for gifts or for your own reading enjoyment.
Any additional money that comes in beyond the cost of the website design and web hosting will be used for advertising the website on Google and other search engines as well as sending out press releases to appropriate news sources.
If you have sent me your confirmation, you'll receive information from me in the next few days. If you still want to join this exciting new undertaking, drop me a note at Bonkaye@aol.com.

Déjà vu, Airleaf vu, Jones Harvest Publishing too!
Part of moving forward is learning from the mistakes of the past and not allowing ourselves to become victims again. It is with great sadness that I have to warn our members about another predatory publishing scam that has re-incarnated itself and replaced the fraudulence of Airleaf Publishing.
In the past six months, I personally have received nine different horror stories about Jones Harvest Publishing primarily from senior citizens who invested thousands of dollars into an Airleaf-type dream and in all but one case, after they invested and lost thousands of dollars at Airleaf. These people were sold promises—just like at Airleaf. Here is a typical sales pitch (from one of the numerous Jones Harvest websites listed below) that one author sent me from the package she paid $5,000.00 for over a year ago:
(I am substituting the book title and author name to protect the innocent)
Bright Tomorrow should make you a celebrity!
Dear Joan C.,
Has your publisher or publicist ever even read Bright Tomorrow? Or are you and your book known by an account or book number?
There are hundreds of vanity publishing, publicity and literary agencies across the nation—some charging ten to twenty thousand dollars—and all of them waiting for the thousands of authors that write new manuscripts every year.
These companies will publish or just print overpriced books, and attempt to provide royalty-paying publishing deals, or write press releases and promotions to try to get a review written…all of this is done by email (SPAM), of course, if that.
Author Celebrity Associates is different. We make promises and keep them. WE WILL READ YOUR BOOK. We will find out what makes it special and how best to present it. If you choose, we will publish or republish your book at no extra charge.
We want Bright Tomorrow to make you a celebrity. You deserve it. We also want to make this very easy for you. All we need from you is your book or manuscript—whatever way is most convenient. With that, we make the following commitments to you:
• WE WILL READ YOUR BOOK IMMEDIATELY
• We will publish or republish your book in 60 days or less. (Optional, but no charge)
• We will pay you 100% of the profits from the book sales until you have earned back our fee.
• We will feature a picture of you on the home page of www.Authorcelebrity.com
• When a reader clicks on your name or picture, they will see your book(s) and information.
• We will place your book for sale on 10 websites including amazon.com
• We will call every newspaper, magazine, and radio station in your hometown and report.
• We will guarantee one television appearance and provide you with a DVD version.
• We will guarantee 3 separate AM or FM interviews in major metropolitan markets.
• We will guarantee a fourth interview on nationally syndicated AM/FM radio show.
• We will submit your book to a film producer for review and recommendations.
We will not be attempting to make these things happen. Each of these commitments is guaranteed. We won't stop there either; our plan is to do much, much more. We will also continue to publicize and sell your book as long as you let us, (or until you get a better offer) at no extra charge.
We will not be satisfied until we place Bright Tomorrow in bookstores everywhere and (name) is a celebrity. This program has a one-time fee of $7500. There are no further charges of any kind.
Sincerely,
Brien Jones, President
P.S. In your case, the price is $5,000. That is my way of apologizing for the past misfortunes AND showing you what we can accomplish at cost. Please keep this offer confidential. All but a very few authors must pay full price.
Wow—this is AIRLEAF all over again. The authors who have become Jones Harvest victims all have the same story about broken promises including time delays, failure to see galleys, numerous errors in the proofs, virtually no sales, lack of coordination of promises, and disrespect by some of the staff. When the first set of victims came to me in November, I told them to request their money back as I did all of the future ones who wrote to me. Some of these new victims had their money returned after they wrote Jones Harvest a letter threatening to report the company to the FBI and Attorney General. However, there are other victims whom I have recently learned about who have not had their money returned. And I can bet that there are other victims who don't know to come to me for help. Interestingly, most of these victims who contacted me are 70 years or older and vulnerable.
When Brien Jones started his own business in January of 2007, he made claims that he was going to be different than Airleaf. He left Airleaf because of the broken promises that were made to authors. As he stated in a letter to me dated January 30, 2007, "Carl and I had different opinions on how to use Airleaf's resources. I did my best to keep authors from being dissatisfied with our services. In your case I failed and I apologize."
I should have known there was a problem from that letter because I never worked with Brien Jones or even knew who he was. I only learned about him after he left and sent me an introductory letter like many others received. I took the bait because at that point, I knew something was wrong at Airleaf since my money wasn't coming through.
In my early conversations with Brien, he was clear that he had one goal and one goal only—selling books to bookstores. He was totally against the Hollywood trips, the book fairs, and other Airleaf plots because that's not how to sell books. He sounded legit to me, and not knowing differently except from Airleaf making some snide comments about his leaving, I had no reason to doubt him.
As the months went on and I was really disgusted with Airleaf, Brien offered to print my book for free in the summer of 2007 if I would be on his website. I was not opposed to that at all since I had reached the end of my rope with Airleaf. But as I became more involved with the Airleaf Victims group I started in August 2007,(which incidentally was NOT a plot with Brien as Airleaf kept suggesting) and started to read complaint after complaint about Brien Jones, I started to wonder why so many people were holding him responsible for their losses. People were looking for vengeance against him more than Carl Lau. I tried explaining that Brien had nothing to do with the money—that was Carl Lau. But people were adamant—Jones was guilty. They didn't accuse him of keeping the money, but rather of taking their money for packages that were never delivered.
I wrote those authors back saying that we need to target Carl Lau since he was the owner of Airleaf and ultimately the one responsible for not delivering what was paid for and keeping our money to enhance his lifestyle. He had visions of grandeur of becoming a famous Hollywood figure in the movies. His ego allowed him to be taken by the likes of Al Smith and Litestone Entertainment, a crooked "production" company that collaborated to make a number of you believe that your books were being turned into films by highlighting them on their now defunct website. Lau opened up his "Allen Agency" in California to sign movie contracts with authors. The whole thing is beyond bizarre and actually a story worthy of a real Hollywood movie.
I confronted Brien on the complaints coming in, but his answer was always the same. He claimed he sold services—he had no idea the services weren't being delivered. When he learned about it, he left. I would also call him on the complaints about misleading people, but the answer was the same. He was just as salesman. Somehow, Executive Vice President seems like more than a salesman to me. But Brien kept stating he was reforming from whatever sins he participated in while at Airleaf, and people should give him a chance. He even published some of the authors' books for free to show good faith.
But moving forward, I started to see that Brien was doing things in the same way that Airleaf did. I guess Brien realized that just publishing books and selling them wasn't going to make him money. First it was sending media blitzes for $450.00. Then it was going on book tours for $750.00. And of course, he was now going to take your book to Hollywood and pitch it to the movie directors.
If you look on the Jones Harvest website, you will see a whole bunch of other websites that he sponsors including: Author Celebrity Associates, Starred Review, AuthorSoldier (New!), Perfect Heart Publishing, Great Concept Books, Bookwheat, Bargain Book Basement, and Chosen Few. Each concept lures people in through a different door, but all roads end up at the same place.
Also, at the bottom of the shopping list is My Author Profile. According to the website, you can have yourself featured on there for $499.00. Yikes! You can have your own website designed and hosted for less than $100.00 and not have to share it with a bunch of others who will only be viewed by Jones Harvest authors and potential Jones Harvest authors.
Another note of interest: Part of the hook is promising reviews to customers. In a standard letter, it stated:
Also enclosed is a review we've received after sending it to a professional reviewer. We are our reviewers to be honest and to offer a clear perspective of what other readers could expect. As such, we really can't do anything about what it says, that's kind of the nature of the reviews. The reviewers are professionals so they are generally quite respectful and view your work as having an audience, even if it's not every audience.
People pay Jones Harvest to get their books reviewed. I read the review. It was signed by Tim, Brien's former phone receptionist and college nephew. His title under his name was "Media Researcher and Educator, T&R Reviews." The T&R stands for Tim and Rosa, Tim's wife. That's really a credible "professional" source to pay money for, isn't it? Next it will be the scary pumpkin head on his logo or possibly the wilted hay stalk writing the reviews.
Jones Harvest has gone from the original promise of only selling books to bookstores to:
National Blitz - $1850
We will feature your book on the HOME PAGE on our websites, www.jonesharvest.com and www.bookwheat.com, usually the same day you start! That means that any reader or bookstore owner that sees those websites sees your cover.
We will also read your book and write a comprehensive review. This review will then be featured on our unique website www.starredreview.com. We will also submit the review to 20 websites.
We will then write a custom, full-color, one-page promotion for your book. We will send it to you for your approval. You can make whatever corrections you want, at no additional charge. We will then mail it to 1000 bookstores in any markets you choose with an invitation to buy your books and/ or set up book signings. We will follow-up on all responses by telephone or whatever is necessary to place your book or generate a book-signing.
We will also write an AP style press release about your book and submit it to 100 newspapers and magazines. Before we mail it, we will send it to you for approval--again you can make changes at no additional charge.
Most importantly we also assign a telemarketer to you not only to answer responses but to also make outbound calls to newspapers, magazines, media and bookstores in the markets of your choice.
And now he's progressed to a super, duper, deluxe package of the secret price of $5,000.00 reduced from $7,500.00 so you can be a guest on vanity radio with Ian Moore and Stu Taylor, Brien's friends that almost no one listens to. But please keep that information "confidential" because only a few lucky people are getting that special price and we wouldn't want to let the word out!
Bottom line—there's a saying: Hit me once, shame on you. Hit me twice, shame on me.
So far, I haven't seen any of the Jones Harvest customers on television as some have been promised. And I certainly don't see any celebrities in the making. I have to wonder how I ended up on the Jones Harvest Celebrity Authors MySpace account with all of my books since I'm not a Jones Harvest Celebrity. Oh well, maybe Brien will update his site.
My bottom line is that predatory publishing must be stopped at every level. It's doubly insulting that the man who scammed at Airleaf is still pulling the same scam at his own company. It's time to put a stop to the illegal taking of authors' money. If you think you are a victim of Jones Harvest, please contact me and I will be there to guide you into your new membership group!
With love and hope,
Bonnie Kaye

Airleaf Victims Update May 10, 2008

2008-05-10T16:00:00.003-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MAY 10, 2008

Dear Airleaf Friends and Victims,

This is an important week of victory for all of us. It's not the kind of victory that we were hoping for yet—meaning getting back our money or getting recognition by the media that we as a group made this happen—but it is acknowledgement of our plight by the same government agency that I hold responsible for putting us in this position to start with.

By now, you've gotten my message that on Thursday, May 8, the Attorney General of Indiana, Steve Carter, gave this public announcement:

Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter has filed a lawsuit against book publisher and promoter Airleaf, LLC for taking money without providing the promised services in return. The lawsuit is seeking consumer restitution for at least 120 customers.

"More than 120 people are named in the lawsuit, including many from Indiana who lost thousands of dollars,” said Carter. “In fact, hundreds more may have lost money. They paid for services. Airleaf did not deliver, and now, those consumers deserve refunds.”

The lawsuit, filed in the Morgan Circuit Court, alleges Airleaf, formerly known as Bookman Marketing, LLC, and its owner, Carl Lau, violated Indiana’s Deceptive Consumer Sales Act. It states that the company advertised that it would provide book publishing, royalty reimbursement and promotional services to consumers in exchange for payment. The promotional services included in-person participation at book fairs, presentations to Hollywood movie producers, and newspaper, radio and television advertisements.

The lawsuit alleges that Airleaf accepted payment but failed to honor all, or part, of the Client Service Agreements and other agreements, dating back to at least January 2006. It also states than Lau used Airleaf assets and consumer payments to cover expenses unrelated to the business, and that Lau continued to solicit business and accept payments months after he indicated that Airleaf was insolvent

In addition to consumer restitution, the attorney general’s office is seeking civil penalties of up to $5,500 per violation, as well as investigative costs.

So here's what it really means.

1.We have won a victory in the sense that a suit has been filed against Airleaf.
2.Chances are, Airleaf will claim bankruptcy as well as its owner, Carl Lau.
3.It's hard to tell if assets will be uncovered that can be seized to use to reimburse us at this particular time.
4.At least this will stop Carl Lau from ever doing business again.
5.Most importantly at this time, it should be able to push this case to the next level, the federal level, where criminal charges can be brought against the criminals which hopefully will translate into jail time.
6.This case will have government officials more carefully monitoring other companies who are already repeating the Airleaf fraudulence or who plan to.

It's not the end of battle by a long shot. In fact, it's just the beginning. And this will be a long battle. Carl Lau is counting on our anger to pass, our memories to fade, and for our frustration to make us give up. WE CAN'T. We must remain vigilant in our efforts to see this man and other fraudsters punished accordingly. So, hang in there with me fellow victims. Let's not give up one inch or one ounce. I know this is a lengthy battle ahead of us, but we will stick together until we win.

One question that people have asked me is if they are one of the 120 people that the state of Indiana have sued for. I spoke with my hero, Tom Irons, who handled our case in the AG's office, and he explained that the AG's office can only go back for a two year period to file suit. That means the cases they filed had to be from 2006 –2008.

In Tom's words:

My office does not have any statutory authority to include anyone who dealt with/contracted with Airleaf/Bookman before May 2006. That is why many consumers that filed a consumer complaint with my office were not included in the lawsuit and why those similarly situated and who have not filed a complaint with us should not now do so.

However, each victim has an individual right to hire a private attorney to sue under any contract/agreement up to six years old. Of course the time and money to pursue individual suits in this particular situation does not appear at this point to be justified. I’ll let you know when the lawsuit has been posted on our website--I expect that to happen next week.

Our reality is that Airleaf may not have money per se to pay us back; however, if the federal criminal charges are pressed, Carl Lau may want to negotiate some sort of financial settlement with us. Maybe that's why he's selling our books back to us in order to raise money. (That's my jaded sense of humor—sorry!)

The government will be responsible for finding out what assets Carl Lau has or what assets he has hidden. Only then will we know for sure what money is available to be given back. After the case is posted on the AG website, I'll let you know by email so you can check and see if your name is posted.

Here are some of my personal thoughts on this issue.

I am overly grateful to Tom Irons who took over the job of Terry Tolliver in this case. It was through his persistence that this case was taken seriously and the suit was filed. He did the work on our behalf. He also was the best and most receptive government official I have ever spoken with in my entire life. He was always available to listen to my concerns and complaints; he was never evasive or rude. He's the kind of man that we hope to get in government but rarely find. Even though Steve Carter's name is mentioned in all of the articles concerning this case, he was not the one who helped us. If anything, I hold him responsible for us losing our money. Why? Because after his office issued an AVC order in May of 2007, it was his office's responsibility to watch out for us and to protect us. His office should have been closely monitoring Airleaf after that warning issued.

In one of my January updates, I posted this about the AG's office:

An AVC or Assurance of Voluntary Compliance was issued to Airleaf. An AVC, according to the website of Steve Carter, AG of Indiana is:

An agreement reached between the State and one or more respondents stipulating the conditions under which the respondent(s) will conduct business in the future. An AVC may require the defendant(s) to pay consumer restitution and investigative costs to the attorney general’s office. The document is filed with the court but is not an admission of guilt or liability for any legal offense. The State has a legal right to go back to court if information becomes available that the defendant is not abiding by the terms of the AVC.

This happened to Airleaf on May 25, 2007. Two authors appealed to the AG’s office to help them, and they won. I’ve read through the document, and according to the decision, I cut and pasted some of the major points:

The terms of this Assurance apply to and are binding upon the Respondent, its employees, agents, representatives, successors, and assigns.

The Respondent acknowledges the jurisdiction of the Consumer Protection Division of the Office of the Attorney General to investigate matters hereinafter described, pursuant to the authority of the Indiana Code.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, the subject of a consumer transaction has sponsorship, approval, performance, characteristics, accessories, uses, or benefits it does not have, which the Respondent knows or reasonably should know it does not have.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, the Respondent has a sponsorship, approval, or affiliation in a consumer transaction it does not have, and which the Respondent knows or reasonably should know it does not have.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, the Respondent is able to deliver or complete the subject of the consumer transaction within a stated, or reasonable, period of time, when the Respondent knows or should reasonably know it could not.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, a consumer will be able to purchase an item as advertised by the Respondent, if the Respondent does not intend to sell it.

The Respondent shall fully cooperate with the Office of the Attorney General in the resolution of any future written complaints the Consumer Protection Division receives. This shall include, but is not limited to, the Respondent promptly resolving any additional valid consumer complaints brought to the Respondent's attention by the Office of the Attorney General, either prior to, or after the filing of, this Assurance with the Court.
Upon execution of this Assurance, the Respondent shall pay costs in the amount of One Thousand Dollars ($1,000.00) to the Office of the Attorney General. The Respondent shall fully cooperate with the Office of the Attorney General in the resolution of any future written complaints the Consumer Protection Division receives. This shall include, but is not limited to, the Respondent promptly resolving any additional valid consumer complaints brought to the Respondent's attention by the Office of the Attorney General, either prior to, or after the filing of, this Assurance with the Court.

This is to remind you that the AG's office warned Airleaf back in May of 2007 that this warning would include any additional valid consumer complaints. By October, we had over 100 consumer complaints into that office, but nothing was done to stop Airleaf from operating. They should have been watched carefully from the moment that MY complaint was filed as the first one in this group back in August.

And so, our victory is bitter/sweet. Bitter because if the AG's office had been doing their job, chances are some of us would have had our money back. Sweet because at least we are being recognized as a force to deal with, thanks again to Tom Irons.

We have to also thank Detective Jeff Buskirk who believed in our case. He was willing to compile all of the information to help out the legal authorities.

I'll keep you updated on events as they transpire.

Another thought—I think it's amazing that news reporters are reporting this story but not the story about the Airleaf Victims who forced Airleaf to close its doors and pushed the AG's office into the suit by sending massive complaints. I have sent information to every press source which is doing this. I'll keep you posted on that as well.

BOOK ANNOUNCEMENTS

Each week I am happy to promote your books in this update. If you have new books being published, feel free to share them with the group.

“I Know How A Butterfly Feels” by Ann Palmer - Who doesn't fanaticize about reuniting with their unrequited teenage love? It may be that it becomes more of a desire or secret yearning as we age. When we review our passing years we ask ourselves - "what if..." Few of us are granted that opportunity to try to recapture our past first love. Ann Palmer found him and shares that experience with you. How many men spend years longing to get behind the wheel of an RV and take just off for months of travel across most of the western United States? How many women wonder what it would be like to hop in a motor home and travel the U.S.A. alone? Ann did it and shares her ups and down experiences with you. What realizations can come out of physical as well as an emotional journey within? Read "I Know How A Butterfly Feels," and see for yourself. Do you live in a Cocoon?
“I have spent many years researching world religions and pre-Christian cultures. Had my ego not needed bolstering perhaps my choice would have been archeology or anthropology. All this led me to teaching, leading seminars and creating audio tapes. Thank you for sharing your time with me.” Ann Palmer 1314 Tunnel Rd – Asheville, NC 28805 – (828) 298 3560 –Visit: AnnPalmer.net AnnInAsheivlle@aol.com

By Cary Black
Zen and the Art of Cooking Beer-Can Chicken is the definitive cookbook written about preparing beer-can chicken. The book was written with recipes designed to go with simple beer-cans or with any of the new beer-can style cookers that have emerged in the market.
Featuring recipes for rubs, marinades, brining, and injecting, this book covers the gamut of cooking beer-can poultry. It was written with humor and simplicity and with hilarious illustrations done by he author’s father. Additionally, the book features chapters on cooking beer-can turkeys, some awesome accompaniment dishes and some interesting desserts.
The beer-can style of cooking is fast becoming America’s choice for preparing poultry. As the bird cooks, the fats drain away, while the inside of the bird is continuously infused with moisture. The result is a nutritious, tasty, and moist chicken meal.
See Cary's beautiful website at http://www.redowlpublications.com/ for more information.

That's it for this week. Hang in there…better days are ahead!
With love and hope,
Bonnie 

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MAY 3, 2008

2008-05-03T15:39:00.003-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MAY 3, 2008
Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends:
This week, I'd like to welcome our three new members. We now have 434 members in our group. I have taken down the Google advertising at this point because we have more than enough victims in our group to move forward with governmental legal proceedings. If people go to Google and look up Airleaf, they will find our site fairly close to the top so they can still find us. I also have additional names to contact if more are needed to make our case with the authorities. Although I am not at liberty to discuss the case at this moment, some official public news should be forthcoming in the next few weeks—so hang in!
At this time, we have to put our faith in the Indiana federal and civil authorities whom I am confident are giving good attention to our case. Although Detective Buskirk was very instrumental in putting our case together, the city of Martinsville can't afford to prosecute our case. The last I heard was that their prosecutor has been called away on active duty overseas, and this is okay. I would much prefer to have the larger agencies prosecute this case than the local Martinsville office which would have limited consequences.
I told you two weeks ago that I would share some of the results of my research with you after I completed it. Nearly half of the people who have been in touch with me in our group are senior citizens. Some of them are well into their 80's and one just turned 90. I mention this because a former Airleaf employee told someone off the record that Airleaf did target older people. I found this horrifying because those "golden years" have now been tarnished by Airleaf for so many of our authors. Many of these people wanted to leave a legacy behind for their families and invested all their spare money in promises that were never kept.
Some of our victims are disabled and a number of them live on meager incomes. They gave whatever money they saved to Airleaf with the promise that they would enter the hall of fame. Instead, they are now members of Airleaf's "Hall of Shame."
It was very interesting to see how many people were solicited by Airleaf with letters that said, "We Want Your Book (Name of Book) in Airports All Over America!" The salesmanship was incredible. For those of us who are trusting and naïve, it's easy to see how we could be fooled into believing that this could happen. Airleaf gave the illusion of hit books being sold in book stores all over America. It was a pyramid scheme where some authors—including me—were asked to bring other unsuspecting authors into the "family." I have mentioned this before and I'll mention it again—when I was on my Airleaf "high" in the early days, I was asked to call other potential authors to woo them in. These were big spenders only—people looking to spend between $5,000 and $8,000. I was the recent acquisition that Airleaf was using for their propaganda, sending letters out that one of their authors was on CNN. Yes, I was a compelling case. What Airleaf didn't mention was that I arranged that interview—NOT THEM. They weren't part of that equation at all. Based on my success, they asked me to speak to three different people to try to convince them to come with the company. Sad to say, I did. No doubt, those authors ended up the same way as the rest of us—ripped off.
By the way, there's an off-shoot predatory publishing company of Airleaf's that I will leave unnamed at this moment which most of you have written to me about. This company is having potential victims called by loyal friends of the company to convince them to publish with this company. That's why I strongly advise you before you do anything, feel free to check with me and I will give you honest feedback. Remember the old saying, "Hit my once, shame on you—hit me twice, shame on me!"
Last week, someone posted on our Airleaf Victim's blog a private personal conversation between two former Airleaf employees. I found this despicable. The purpose of our blog is for you to put in comments about your experience—not for employees to embarrass and humiliate each other. I removed the posting as soon as it was brought to my attention by one of our members.
I'd like to congratulate Terri Levine whose book "Coaching is for Everyone" hit the market this week. Terri is excellent at doing marketing. She sent out an email blast asking people to make her book number 1 on Amazon on the date of release, May 1. In return, she offered free workshops to anyone who bought the book. She generated so much excitement that even I bought the book on May 1! I checked her Amazon rating several times that day, and at one point, it was 200! This is an amazing accomplishment that came from some great marketing. If you have any marketing strategies that have worked for you, please send them to me and share them with the group.
In a few weeks, I'll be formulating our new Author Co-op venture where we can all support each other's book sales. Stay tuned!
This week, we have three books I'd like to share with you from our authors who now have them out in print.
From Floriana HallFRANCIS, NOT THE SAINT is a true story of a family’s triumph over adversity during The Great Depression and World War II. It is an important part of history.
It is a mesmerizing story of a wonderful mother who taught her three children morals and manners and was sometimes thought of as a saint, and a father who was anything but a saint, though his religious background gnawed at his very soul.
It is a story of a man who tried to juggle three families at the same time and found out that it cannot be done--a man who lied and cheated and made his children victims of his lies. None of the families had enough food or the necessities of life.
It is a spiritual story of forgiveness which is a criteria for complete and peaceful existence. But most of all, it is a story to help warn young women to beware of egotistical men who flatter too much, flirt too much, cry too much, and who lust for too many.

From Patti Harlow:
Rock With Rodney & Party with Perky to Preserve Wildlife is a book for ages 8 to 18+, because we all need to know! We all need to know about the many assaults happening to Our Environment; affecting our lives! Before it s too late! Rodney the rock n' roll Rabbit, Perky the powerful partying Panther, Dylan the dancing Dog, Courtney the creative Cougar, Taffy the totally tubular Turtle, Fanny the fun-loving Fox, Hart the hilarious Hippo and Sam Slimey Snake get together for a party at Rodney's. While playing a game from Perky s bag of fun, "Way Out Yonder"; a game of the beauty and misfortunes of Our National Parks and Historical Landmarks spread across the USA, they decide to stop playing with fictional plans, and take action with their newly learned knowledge in helping to save Our fragile America the Beautiful!
From Kathy and Mike Staran:
Conch Waves is our latest book, featuring the same main characters of Karen and Mark Stevens as in our earlier book, Palm Monday. In this book, the main characters decide to buy a home in Key West, FL, as a vacation home. They head to Key West, to take ownership and move into their new home, and upon their arrival there, the excitement begins! They both end up taking an incredibly interesting journey throughout the Keys, with a group of characters who will surprise the reader at every twist and turn of the plot. This book features mystery, intrigue, the dark sides of the character's emotions, all amid beautiful scenery in a tropical setting."

That's the news for today. Hang in—better days are ahead!
Love, Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 26, 2008

2008-04-26T18:16:00.002-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 26, 2008

Dear 431 Members of the Airleaf Victims Group and Friends,
This was an interesting week for me on a personal level. I took off this week from work to thoroughly go through files that over 150 of you have sent to me. It was truly a depressing experience to see how many people were connived into so many non-existent services through Airleaf. Even though I've heard the stories each time you send them to me, going through all of this for four days truly gave a comprehensive view of the ongoing fraudulence against our authors.

Thanks to many of your meticulous tracking and record keeping, I was able to send the authorities solid information to prove our case of fraudulence. Many of you sent me email correspondences between you and other Airleaf employees which also proved that promotions were sold to you that were never delivered. One of you even sent me an email of a private conversation between two Airleaf employees who were romantically involved which also talked about Airleaf fraud in the conversation. Incidentally, this email was meant to turn people against one of the employees who left last year. Normally, I would be amazed at a company that has employees who would stoop so low to cut and paste private conversations and email them to authors deliberately, but nothing amazes me at Airleaf.

If you didn't send me your information and you think you have proof or evidence of fraudulence, it is not too late. Please email me at Bonkaye@aol.com and I will let you know how to proceed to get it to me.

Last week, I reprinted the story for you from the Martinsville Reporter about the Airleaf update. I also sent you the response I posted to the paper. Can you believe that later that night I was CENSORED?? The Martinsville Reporter took down my posting because one former employee was so incensed by this comment:
The employees of Airleaf profited off of our innocence. Two of them for sure were in Hollywood having great sex in a hotel while they were supposed to be selling our books to Hollywood producers. Those escapades were paid for by our hard earned money.Did you see me mention anyone's name here? Of course not. But this former employee was so distraught seeing this comment that she insisted it be removed. Now, I don't quite understand this unless she is guilty of the accusation and paranoid to think that people will assume it is her I'm talking about. So, I had to redo the response to the paper and remove the sexual comment in order for it to stand. Ironically, that former employee in her hysteria posted the following message on my Airleaf Victims blog:
Anonymous said...
Unless you were there, I am not sure where the ad hominem comment about someone having 'great sex' originated. We may have to start a new web site == victims of Bonnie Kaye.

I'm not sure what an "ad hominem" that the anonymous party stated is, but let me rephrase my comment about the former employees "having great sex." I would like to apologize for making assumptions, so I'll correct the statement by just saying "having sex." The "great" description was obviously the assumption on my part.

One of our victims wrote to me about checking with Bob Denton before you pay any money to Carl Lau for ANYTHING. If you are notified that you have books for sale at Airleaf that you can buy back, ask Bob Denton first if this is true. I believe you can actually negotiate to buy your books back more cheaply than Carl is asking for. I base this on one author who was offered her books back for approximately 60 cents each. Once again, I have no clue why some people are being charged 60 cents vs. a dollar vs. two dollars and more. Authors continue to tell me how responsive Bob Denton is towards helping them get back their books and materials. We greatly appreciate this Bob.

NEW BOOK OF THE WEEK:
One of our new author victims, Doris Christian, had her new book "A Daughter's Cry" released this week.

Doris sent us this information about her new book:
A Daughter's Cry was born out of my own experiences. First, my mother's sexual abuse at the hands of her dad, left many victims--not only my mother and several of her sisters, but also for me and my 4 siblings. Due to the bitterness and I'm sure the shame my mother harbored inside, she was a very unhappy person. This resulted in her many years of negativity, harsh criticism and overall strained relationships with everyone. And, it left us, her children, feeling unloved and unwanted.

Then, years later, my own two daughters were sexual molested by their stepfather, my second husband. From this heartache came a powerful story line in A Daughter's Cry. In it, my heroine, Ellie, learns there IS life after such traumatic attacks and our life's purpose can still be attained.

This is my fifth novel and the most compelling. Already, I've heard positive reports from women who were abuse victims. There is no greater reward than to hear
our hard work has delivered the intended results. I feel very blessed, indeed!

I am a single, senior citizen whose passion is writing. I retired from the medical field and now enjoy travel, my two wonderful daughters and numerous friends.
Writing has opened many doors for me and I'm currently teaching a creative writing course for single men and women.

To my fellow authors: I believe the injustice we've been dealt through Airleaf can be somewhat nullified when we support each other. What Airleaf failed to do, we can perhaps do and do it far better. There is strength in numbers and marketing our work successful requires those numbers. Certainly, not everyone will buy each book shared here, yet, it's an opportunity we didn't have before. Like making lemonade out of all those lemons? Here we can share the positive amid the negative which, I believe, is always a good thing. Because of our dedicated leader, Bonnie Kaye, we have this wonderful opportunity to share, care and repair. Share our work, care about each other, and repair the damage Airleaf and Carl Lau has caused each one of us. Thank you in advance for helping get A Daughter's Cry into the hands of those who've been used, abused, or neglected by someone they know and trusted. The release date is April 22nd and available on Amazon.com as well as Tate publishing.com

I'd like to wish Doris the best of luck with her new book. Soon we'll be discussing our Airleaf Author's co-op to help each other sell our books.

That's all the news for today! Please send me any questions or concerns you may have about any issue.

Love, Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update April 19, 2008

2008-04-19T19:30:00.002-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 19, 2008
Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,
We are now at 431 Airleaf Victims. I'd like to wish a Happy Passover to all of our Jewish members of the group.
This week, I will be off from my regular job reviewing all of your surveys that you sent to me a couple of months ago in order to identify information to help the government agencies investigating our case. I am hoping to find key documentation that will help us prove the fraudulence that we are claiming. I will let you know some of my results next week.
Thank all of you who told me you wrote to 60 Minutes. If you didn't have a chance to do so, please do so this week. Their email address is: 60m@cbsnews.com. I want them to understand the enormity of our case when it comes to fraudulence. Please put in the subject box, "A Victim of Airleaf Publishing Fraud," or something similar. The more stories they receive, the more convincing our campaign will be.
Today, the Martinsville Reporter released another update. Our reporter friend, Ron Hawkins, has interviewed a number of people including some former employees who were there during Airleaf's last moments.

Feds investigating Airleaf, former employee says

By Ronald Hawkins | rhawkins@reportert.com
Saturday April 19, 2008
Martinsville
At least one former employee of the defunct Airleaf Publishing and Book Selling company has been questioned as a part of a federal investigation into the company's practices, according to that former employee.
The potential criminal filings against the Martinsville-based, vanity publishing and marketing business would be in addition to the multiple civil actions filed against owner Carl Lau and the company he operated until late last year.
In an interview, former Airleaf vice president and sales person Dawn Rodgers said she was questioned on Good Friday by U.S. Postmaster General investigators regarding Airleaf. The investigation is being done in conjunction with the FBI, she said.
Martinsville Police Department Capt. Jeff Buskirk, who investigated Airleaf for local law enforcement authorities, said he's turned over his materials to the FBI.
Bonnie Kaye, a Philadelphia-based author who started airleafvictims.com, said she'd contacted the FBI about Airleaf.
FBI special agent Wendy Osborne, however, said, "The FBI doesn't confirm or deny investigations."
An insider's story
Former Airleaf vp Rodgers worked for two periods at Airleaf. In the first, she had been promoted to vice president of marketing before she left and in the second was a marketing sales person. She was one of the last employees to leave before Lau shut down the business.
Author Kaye said she believes Rodgers shares some of the blame with Lau.
"She was taking money under fraudulent pretenses," Kay said. "She continued taking money after production shut down."
Rodgers said she is as much of a victim as the Airleaf customers who didn't receive the books or marketing services they were promised.
"If anyone's a victim," Rodgers said, "it's me."
Rodgers, who is currently unemployed, said Lau still owes her money.
"He owes everybody," she said.
Lau didn't respond to requests for comments on this story. In a previous interview, however, Lau said after co-founder and Airleaf Executive Vice President Brien Jones left, the business started heading downhill. Lau said Jones, who started his own vanity publishing business in Bloomington, tried to persuade former Airleaf customers not to do business with him.
Jones has said that's not the case
Rodgers, who worked with Jones, said the business headed downhill after Jones left in January 2007, but the cause was the loss of Jones' skills. The sole bad guy in the story, she said, is Lau.
"He didn't have the integrity to run a good business ," Rodgers said. "I wish Carl would accept responsibility for what he did. ...
"I don't think Brien was one of the bad guys. He cared about the business. It went crazy after he left. ...I'd like Carl to be held responsible."
Rodgers said she believed in Lau until the end, when things began to rapidly unravel.
About Airleaf
Airleaf Publishing and Book Selling was a vanity publishing firm based in Martinsville that published and marketed books. Established nearly six years ago, it shut its 35 Industrial Drive offices in mid-December. Many of Airleaf's authors were previously unpublished. Airleaf offered packages for authors that included printing and for an additional price promised it would pitch books to movie studios. Other packages included promises of ad placements in major newspapers and magazines along with interviews on national radio shows and more.
"I believed in what I did, otherwise I wouldn't have done it," Rodgers said. "We all did what we had to do. We cared more about the company than Carl."
In an interview Thursday, Jones said since he started his own business he's had 400 clients and there have been no complaints.
Investigation questioned
Jones questioned whether there is an investigation.
"No one has ever contacted me," Jones said. "I would think at some point someone would have. ...I would think I would be one of the first people they contacted."
Rodgers said the investigators "didn't go into much" about what charges there might be against Law.
The founders of Airleaf, which started as Bookman Publishing and Marketing, had good intentions when they started the business, Rodgers said. Most of the marketing promotions such as cruises and appearances at book shows and even pitches to Hollywood studios happened.
"I don't believe either (Lau or Jones) started with the intent to defraud," Rodgers said.
Martinsville resident Bob Denton is helping some authors receive their books. Denton left Airleaf a month before it closed, he said, but still manages the building and managed it before Lau acquired it. The building is for sale.
Denton worked for Lau for 4-1/2 years in sales, product shipping and receiving, he said. Since leaving, Denton started Mountain Valley Publishing, a publishing firm that he operates out of his home and has some of Airleaf's former clients.
Denton said he left Airleaf because he knew if he sold a publishing package, the money wasn't there to produce it. Denton agreed with Rodgers and Lau that the business started to decline after Jones left.
"At first, it was a good business," Denton said. "It got a lot of people's work published. I don't think they intended to defraud anybody.
"They just ran out of money. Why? I don't know. Carl made a lot of bad business decisions." That was the end of the story.
Here is my response. Please feel free to post your own response to this story.
My name is Bonnie Kaye. I am the organizer of the group Airleaf Victims found at www.AirleafVictims.com. I would like to clarify some of the issues in this story.
It's not just a matter of Carl Lau being a bad businessman; it's a matter of his operation knowingly committing fraudulence against our 431 authors. We do hold Lau responsible because he held the purse strings; however, other employees were totally aware that services were not being delivered nor were they ever intended to be delivered. These employees include the ones told by Lau to pretend he was in Europe while he sat behind his desk, never saw an ad in the NY Times or LA Times for Airleaf books, or never waved Bon Voyage to the people who paid for the Carnival Cruise that never was booked. By knowing fraud was going on and not reporting it to authorities, they were participating in it or covering it up.
Dawn Rogers claims to also be a victim by comparing the loss of a paycheck to the loss of people's years of hard work, throwing money away down the drain that they saved for their futures, and the pain of calling dozens of times and being ignored because services were not being delivered. Let's be for real. Ms. Rogers was there until the very last day begging people for their credit cards selling them packages that were never going to happen--and she knew it.
Let's not turn the bad guys into the heroes and the victors into the victims. The employees of Airleaf profited off of our innocence. Two of them for sure were in Hollywood having great sex in a hotel while they were supposed to be selling our books to Hollywood producers. Those escapades were paid for by our hard earned money.
Everyone who took part in misleading us should be ashamed of themselves. So far, I haven't heard anyone say a simple, "I'm sorry." That might be a good starting point. If ex-employees are looking for pity, this is not the place to find it. Start taking responsibility for your action, and maybe then maybe we'll feel something besides contempt.
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.That's the end of my story! Here's the link for the paper in case you would like to post your own comments:
Link to Martinsville Reporter story:
By the way, Bob Denton has changed his email address and wanted me to share that with you. You can reach him at: bdenton308@comcast.net. If you sent Bob an email recently and didn't get a response, please resend it to that address because it may have gotten lost in transition.
One of our readers wrote to me stating that Carl Lau sent her back a disk but it was blank. She was wondering if any of our other authors had the experience. If so, please let me know. Another author sent me a note that Carl Lau was requesting $2.50 per book. Once again, if you are being asked for money for your books by Carl Lau, please let me know.
This week, I'd like to introduce two new books by our Victim's group. The first book is by John Krismer. John used my new publisher, CCB Publishing, for his book (CCBPublishing.com). Here is the cover and synopsis:

Few realize a New World Order plans to replace our constitution with a Single World Government, nor that our Federal Reserve Bank is privately owned and is not subject to oversight by Congress or the President. Its stockholders include the Rockefellers, Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers of New York; the Rothschild’s of London and Berlin; the Lazard Brothers of Paris; Israel Seiff of Italy; the Kuhn & Loeb Company of Germany; and the Warburgs of Hamburg and Amsterdam, earning almost two billion dollars a day in interest as they buy off our dysfunctional Congress and intentionally level this great nation.
George H. W. Bush, the undisputed “Overlord” of the Shrub Dynasty, in his State of the Union Message in 1991 said: “What is at stake is more than one small country, it is a big idea – a new world order.” Did We the People ever agree to this treasonous act of turning over our nation’s sovereignty to a Single World Government?

About the Author
John R. Krismer, MHA-LFACHE is founder and CEO of Health Systems Institute, consulting with governments, hospitals, clinics, and professional organizations. He has conducted hundreds of educational institutes, and served as a principal investigator, researching the health record database system, which involved four major universities. He has served as CEO of several hospitals and corporations, and as a board member of two health insurance companies. He has been referred to as a visionary ahead of his time.
Another one of our victims, Terry Levine, has a new book that will be available on the first day of May. Terry is a well-known personal coach, and you can view her website at http://www.CoachInstitute.com. Terry sent this note:
I am asking you for one favor please. My new book Coaching is For Everyone is available on Amazon.com on May 1 and is by far my most exciting and best book yet.
My request is that you help me make this book an Amazon.com best seller on May 1. I am not asking you to buy a bunch of stuff - just one copy of a book that you will love and if you just send me (Terri@TerriLevine.com) your receipt from Amazon.com I will send you a FREE ticket to my next event worth $500!
Please ask everyone in your network, in your data base and email lists to do this for me. Together, on the May 1st release date, we can really ring the bell in the coaching world and make my pride and joy a number 1 bestseller on amazon.com.
I appreciate you and your assistance in making my dream come true and sharing my finest work with the world. Here is the link to my book on amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/Coaching-Everyone-Learn-Your-Coach/dp/1600373968/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1208296251&sr=8-2

My Goal Is YOUR Success!
Terri Levine, The Guru of Coaching SM
President
Comprehensive Coaching U, Inc.
727 Mallard Place, North Wales, PA 19454 Phone:877-401-6165
Create a great home based business coaching clients over the phone!
Visit http://www.CoachInstitute.com today!
Good luck to both of our new authors. I'm happy to publicize any new books that you are creating. Just let me know!
Next week I'll report on more news with our case. Have a good week, and keep up the faith. Justice will be ours!
Love, Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update April 12, 2008

2008-04-12T16:32:00.003-04:00

Airleaf Victims Update April 12, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,
As of today, we have 431 members in our group. Welcome to our new members.
This is where I ask you all for help once again. I am trying to help make a case for the authorities who are investigating this case. I know I asked you this question before, and some of you responded, but now I'll ask you again in hopes that everyone will respond. Next week, I'll be taking a week's vacation from my job so I can devote myself to going through all of the surveys that everyone has sent me in a thorough way. But that will be time consuming and I need information NOW.

Here's what I need:

If you paid for the following specific marketing services to Airleaf that you never received, I need to hear from you so I can pass this information along.

Here's the specific information:

Book fairs for London or Germany
Ads in the NY Times, LA Times
The trip on the Carnival cruise
Television or radio commercials that never took place
Kirkus reviews or Bowker reviews

Please let me know that date to the best of your recollection that you paid for the services, who your representative was, and what you were told when you followed up waiting for any results. Just drop me an email and let me know. Thanks so much.

Also, if you are an author who has been told by Carl Lau that he wants you to pay for your books for either $1.00 or $2.00 each, please send me a note and let me know that your books are being ransomed to you. And if you've already paid, please let me know. All of this will help our case.

If you are a newer member of our group and didn't get a copy of my survey, please let me know so I can email it to you so you can help me track you as it pertains to our action.

There may be some interest by the news show 60 Minutes about our case. I think this would be a great venue for us to publicize our cause of stopping predatory publishers. I sent them a press release about our situation and they did ask me to send more information. Now I am asking you to drop them a line about what happened to you. If they can receive several hundred emails by Monday or Tuesday, this will be very powerful. Please click this direct link for the email to pop up: 60m@cbsnews.com. In your email, please put in the subject box, "Help for the Airleaf Victims" or "I am an Airleaf Victim." In the email, tell them your name, where you live, the name of your book or proposed book, and how you were violated by Airleaf. Ask them for help to expose the fraudulence so that other publishers won't do this again. You can tell them you are a member of the Airleaf Victims organization at www.AirleafVictims.com. Let them know that we want this fraudulence exposed. After you send the email, please let me know or copy me on the email. Thanks so much. This will be very powerful for us if we can have a mass group send this out.

One of the best ways to start marketing your book is by having a website that people can refer to. Lots of you paid big bucks to Airleaf to have your book posted on their site. This is an expense, but not nearly as expensive as you might think. You can buy a domain name at www.Register.com for $35.00 for the year. Pick a name that illuminates what you have written about. I helped our victim Sarah Harrison pick hers for the book she recently published "You Love Your Daddy, Don't You?" about her true life experience with incest. I helped Sarah with the domain name of www.IncestVictim.com.

When you click into it, you'll see her new beautiful site. I have a website designer, Tina's Web Design, who is charging our Airleaf Victims $200.00 per site. If you need updates or changes, she charges $5.00 each which is extremely reasonable. If you need help with this, let me know. There's no charge for website hosting if you go with Register.com for the year and buy the domain name from them for the $35.00, and the one page website is free. It's a steal of a deal! I can help you pick out a domain name that's good for your site and walk you through the simple process of buying it. This way, when you're doing publicity for your book, you have a website to send people to where they can buy it.

Last week, I published a letter from one of our authors about Dorrance publishing charging her by the word. These were two of the responses I received from our members:

Bonnie,

I, too, was duped by Dorrance "Publishing". I paid $12,500 to print 1,000 books. (I negotiated to alter their contract which normally only printed 500 books for this price.) Granted, it was hardbound, color, but that was insanely high and I chose to go with them because they promised to "continue to print books for 2 years to fill orders without any further charge." They also had an 800 number and the staff and where with all to take credit card orders and supposedly had connections to distributors. Well, I got my 100 books, and sold them in a month, ordered 100 more (at a 45% discount off cover so I paid MORE money to them) sold those and ordered and got another 100, sold those and was ready to order more when I was told they had zero in inventory. They had only printed 400 of the 1,000 upfront.

I had on my own, found a Baker & Taylor rep. who agreed to carry my book, had it on Amazon.com, had 4 local bookstores lined up to buy and do book signings, had a tv spot to advertise an outdoor market I paid $150 to be at to sell books. They proceeded to have a COMPLETE stock out for 5 months during which time I lost all credibility with the local stores, had to attend a market in which I sold artwork based on the book since I had NO BOOKS to sell, and was so upset that we got an attorney. The fine print stated they would print to meet demand, not that they would guarantee any stock. Very sneaky. So after paying attorney's fees of $400 I got as a settlement 50 books for the price of shipping. (These were later deducted from my amount of 1,000 to print). Well, we had a major catastrophic medical event in which my child needed lots of attention and My Prince had to go on hold. The contract eventually expired and they agreed to pay me $2,000 back and the few books they had in inventory since they never met their initial commitment.

This sounds crazy that I spent so much for this book, but I only had to sell 3,245 books to break even. I knew I could do it. Sales and demand were beginning to take off, then they had no books to sell and put the brakes on me. I want people to know that they are NOT interested in the book doing well. They control how/when/how many books you can sell. I would have done better to go to a local printer (they were $10,000 for 1,000) but I thought I could not do the ISBN and Copyright and credit card sales without help.

They are worse than Airleaf...I never paid them for marketing, only for BOOKS which they never did produce per our contract. I would advise anyone to burn their money in lieu of going to Dorrance Publishing.

Marcia S.

Hello dear Bonnie,
It looks like there's a lot going on with Airleaf and ideas for publishing. All of us victims are very lucky to have your leadership and strong perseverance.

I want you to know that I copyrighted my book "GRILL!" in February of 2007. In the past year I have received two letters from Dorrance Publishing. They found my name on file at the Library of Congress U.S. Copyright Office. Since my fiasco with Airleaf, I took it upon myself to research them on the net. I found several sites with people sharing their bad reports about them, so I tore the letters from Dorrance up. At first I had believed their desire to publish me was legitimate, but thanks to you I am very cautious on making spontaneous decisions about publishing.

You may share my experience with our group if it will be helpful in any way. I now realize that a publishing company must need business bad if it has to search for clients by searching the copyright office.
Love, Diane

If you have information about other companies who are scamming authors, feel free to send me a letter and I will print it here to warn others. As I tell so many of you who write to me, we were victims once—don't fall prey again! Check out every offer and feel free to send it to me to check it out for you as well.

Here is an excellent link for you regarding talk shows and hosts throughout the country. There are hundreds of the biggest talk show hosts listed as well as their websites and phone numbers. If you have publicity about your book or would like to pitch your book to them, send them a note at their email addressed listed under "contact information". The link is:

Link for talk shows: TALKERS magazine - Heavy Hundred 2008
That's the news for today. Write to me if you have any questions or concerns.

With love and hope,

Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 5, 2008

2008-04-05T09:11:00.001-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE APRIL 5, 2008
Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,
Welcome to our two new members. We now have reached 429 members of our group.
On the legal front, I feel confident that some legal proceedings are progressing. Please be patient as action is happening. You can be sure that I am checking on a regular basis with the various authorities. So far, I feel assured there is movement in our direction.
I'd like to start off this week with something to amuse you. I am Jewish. We have a word in our language which is "Chutzpah." Even if you're not Jewish, you may be familiar with it. But in case you're not, it translates into "gall," or excuse my language, "balls." This concerns Carl Lau, Airleaf fraud perpetrator, as we are trying to get our books being held hostage by the thousands in the Airleaf building. Bob Denton has kindly offered to retrieve our books back for the cost of the postage. However, some authors were getting notes from him stating that Carl wants to be paid $1.00 per book in order to release the books. So I called Bob to see what's up with that.
Bob explained that Carl said he, Bob, can return books to authors if the books were paid for and just being stored at Airleaf; however, if the authors paid for the Airleaf publishing services and received their 25 or 50 books as was agreed to in the contract, they have to pay to get any additional books that might have been printed because Carl claims they belong to him.
Now, quite frankly, I have some deep, severe philosophical disagreements with this kind of thinking. Carl Lau claims these are "his" books because we didn't pay for the additional books that are sitting there. He hasn't considered the additional monies that we paid for marketing services that were never performed or the royalties that were never received. But then I started thinking some more about this, and I called Bob back. I told him to please let Carl know that if anyone is in that situation, we want to know the name of the printer. I have had several printers come to me telling me why they stopped printing for Airleaf—namely because Carl Lau owed them thousands of dollars. So I suspect that many of our books that Carl wants to charge authors for were never paid for anyway. But you can be sure I'll be checking this out with the printers.
If you are an Airleaf victim in this situation where your books are being held for ransom by Carl Lau, please let me know immediately so I can work with you to see if we can locate the printer and whether or not your book was one that was never paid for. If so, we will have new charges to report to the federal government—which would be excellent.
Please remember—this has nothing to do with Bob Denton who is really trying to help authors by retrieving our books, discs, and materials. Bob is doing all the labor for free including finding materials, packing them, and shipping them. This was not his idea, and he has given Carl Lau his opinion backing us.
One of our Airleaf authors, Gertrude, wrote to me about a book company she used, Dorrance, located in Pittsburgh, PA. She told me that she was charged "by the word." This is something new to me. Several others have written to me about this company. Here's what she asked me to ask you:
Dear Bonnie:

I found one statement of my account dated for 9/25/2005. They did charge me by the word. They also charged me $480.00 for alteration fee when they deliberately changed some of the words and I had to get them to change the words back. I think they really took advantage of me because I was not familiar with the publishing business. From the statement of 9/25/2005, I paid them a grand total of $13,780.00. I don't know if there is anything that I can do about it now.

Yesterday, I found a blog site under their name. I didn't know that this blog site was there when I was dealing with them. I don't know whether I should add a comment to the blog site or not. I don't know if there is anything I can do about this situation, if they are the only publishing company that does this. I don't know if they have charged their other authors the same as they did me. Do you think I should add a comment on the blog site about the way that they charged me?

Sincerely,
Gertrude
Please let me know if you have had any similar experiences with this company.
One of our author's, Anita, asked the question about ownership of the ISBN number. I referred the question to my new publisher, Paul, from CCB Publishing, and here was his response:
Thanks for passing along Anita’s question. The answer is that the Publisher owns the ISBN number, not the author. If the author wishes to have their book re-published by another author, a new ISBN number is required.
When re-publishing books as a second edition, CCB Publishing provides a new ISBN number free of charge.
Hope this helps! Paul

Since last week's update, I received a number of comments about copyrighting. I had several dozen people panicked when they wrote to me after seeing that their books with Airleaf and others were not copyrighted at all, even though the books had that imprint.
Here were some of the responses. The first is from my POD guru, Victoria Strauss:

Hi, Bonnie,

Just wanted to address this, from the last Airleaf update:

Take a moment to check your book in the link below to find out. If it's not there, your book is unprotected and anyone can copy it and say it is theirs.
This isn't true. By law, authors have copyright from the minute they
write down the words. Their work is fully protected from that moment,
and they don't need to take any action to ensure that.

Copyright registration is an additional step that US-based authors can
take (most countries have no formal registration process). It doesn't
confer any additional protection--all it does is to give you the right
to sue in court if your work is infringed. In the USA, you MUST have
previously registered your copyright in order to bring an infringement
suit.

However, infringement of unpublished work is so rare as to be
functionally nonexistent, so registration is not necessary for
unpublished works. Many authors are terrified of theft or plagiarism,
but it really should be last on their worry list. There's no need to
register copyright before a work is published.

There's a lot more detail about copyright on the Copyright page of
Writer Beware: http://www.sfwa.org/beware/copyright.html

Should Airleaf authors register? If their books are on the market,
especially if they're selling their own stock of books, it's probably a
good idea (though if they were to republish with any changes, they'd
need to re-register). For anyone whose book was never published by
Airleaf, however, registration is not necessary.

Hope this is helpful!

Victoria Strauss
Personal Website: http://www.victoriastrauss.com/
Writer Beware: http://www.writerbeware.org/
Blog: http://www.accrispin.blogspot.com/
The next note was from Mark Levine at Click Industries (www.Clickindustries.com), a company that helps authors with solutions to many issues as far as publishing. I have been in touch with Mark for over a year and he has always been very responsive and accommodating. He wrote:
Bonnie,
Just wanted to let you know that even if a company doesn't register an author's copyright, it doesn't mean that the book is unprotected and can be taken/used by anyone. Yes, if a company tells you it's registering the copyright and doesn't, it's fraud, but the author isn't totally left in the cold.
A writer has what is known as a common law copyright once the work is produced in any tangible form. Registering the work with the US Copyright Office provides other benefits (http://bookpublisherscompared.com/why_copyright.asp). But, if a third-party used an author's book without the author's permission, the author could still sue and recover damages, even if the book wasn't registered with the US Copyright Office. With all of the suffering of the Airleaf authors, I want to make sure they don't have an extra thing to worry about.
The above link provides all the details about why someone should register their work with the US Copyright Office.
Mark
And this information came from Helen at Artship Publishing:
Hello Bonnie. Since you are doing such a formidable job distributing advice and information to the authors in the VICTIMS group, I would like to offer some, if you would be so kind as to distribute these clarifications in none of your newsletters.

Books Printed and “In Stock”-- please note that POD means “print on demand”. This means that an author who has self-published can take an order, put in the print order with the printer, receive the book and ship it one-at-a-time, avoiding the necessity for big print order fees and inventory. It’s a good way of avoiding the dreaded “returns” too. In some instances the POD printer will ship the book out to the customer directly, but this is rare.

Re bookstores and other resellers, naturally the author would hope that there are at LEAST 1 or 2 of his/her books on the shelf for customers to browse through— and an author can persuade local stores to carry them in various ways: go preparing to set up a display, talk the store into a book-signing, take a free book and a poster-- and there are dozens (yes, dozens!) of other creative ways to get stores to carry the book. The author should in ALL instances sell the books to the bookstore at a discount (the store needs to make money, too) and guarantee returns after4 a decent period of time. All these rules and ideas are outlined in good books for self-publishing authors, such as the one by Tom & Marilyn Ross-- and NO author should even consider self-publishing without going through this learning curve FIRST.

COPYRIGHT. When Copyright is applied for, the author needs to fill out form TX (available from the Copyright office web site), pay the fee, and provide two copies of the book. If the book has not yet been published (the Copyright office defines “publication” as the date when, and the form in which, the book is made available to the public for purchase), the author CAN provide 2 copies of the manuscript. However the most common practice is to apply for the ISBN and the SAN prior to publication, and to apply formally for copyright when copies of the published book are available.

Incidentally, even if your book is not yet registered with the copyright office, your intellectual rights as author are protected as soon as you write it. There have been many, many cases in which an author was able to win a plagiarism court case proving his ms was written by him first even before it was registered in the copyright office. He who writes it first, owns it. Authors should research this topic thoroughly, and applying for a SAN at the earliest opportunity helps.

Also, don’t expect the Copyright Office to send you that letter immediately. It can take 6 months or longer.

If an author is using a “vanity press” (fee-based) or an independent publisher, that publisher will, if it is legitimate and organized, supply the author with all the registration numbers long before the book appears in print— and will send 2 copies to the Copyright office as soon as it IS in print for registration there. So the offer by Fidel Publishing confuses me a bit. If an author has already had his book published somewhere, the Copyright should have been part of the publishing service. Authors should demand contracts which spell all this out.

Another tidbit: Don’t use AuthorHouse. They are being sued in class-action for dishonest practices. I personally know one author whose book is being printed in mass numbers by AuthorHouse and sold in the orient at prices so low that he earns pennies on each book. This was not in their contract, either.

Contracts: an author needs a contract which spells out everything. But, of course if an author doesn’t know the pitfalls, it’s easy to overlook or not anticipate something important. It’s a good idea to have a lawyer who is familiar with the publishing field. After all, in addition to your rights to your own intellectual property, it’s money-- perhaps BIG money-- and you do NOT purchase services without a valid contract, any more than you’d buy a house without legal paperwork, that has been ready by your attorney.

A word about ArtshipPublishing: We write contracts and we urge authors to have their attorneys review them.

We also help authors get their books finalized, polished, completely registered (published), designed, printed, publicized, and distributed — often, without an initial cash investment on their part.

For me to take on the publicity job though, I have to be sure that there is a “fit”, that we both might not be better off if that author searched out an agent or other publisher instead— for instance where it comes to children’s books, religious books, teen novels and other very specialized genres where I have less experience than I do in non-fiction, medical, and historical areas. The subsidizing I do puts our company at risk, so I have to be selective as to which books go into print through ARTSHIP at our own cost— we are NOT Random House! But I’m glad to consider them all, give my honest advice, and offer what services which would be appropriate.

For those who — like all of the authors who approached AIRLEAF— are seeking a publicity agent, I have surveyed over twenty of the most prominent book-publicity houses and publicity departments of publishing houses, and the information is contained in a detailed report— it covers who does what, specifically; whether they take your book online and to reviewers, etc, or sell you the tools so you can do it yourself; which ones offer services for flat fees or customize campaigns; and so on.

I also communicate with over 25 printers; I have a report on which ones offer digital vs. offset, at what quantities, their fees, which are P.O.D., and so on.

Either of these reports can save an author literally, weeks of lost time and speed up that part of the learning-curve.

The role I fill most frequently is the book-designer and publishing role. I get the book formatted with fonts, visuals, size, page layouts, etc. as appropriate and in a way that will enhance the content of the book.

Good luck Bonnie, keep up your amazing work.

My best— Helen Compton
http://www.ArtshipPublishing.com
So, the bottom line—I wouldn't panic if your book is not copyrighted. If it gives you peace of mind, get it done for the $45.00 fee either by yourself or through Fideli Publishing who is offering to do it free as a courtesy to our victims (just for the cost of the fee).
Also, Helen brought up an IMPORTANT POINT that I will now reinforce. If you do go to a new publisher, MAKE SURE YOU RECEIVE A SIGNED CONTRACT. I hate to tell you how many of us did business with Airleaf without having one. And I'm not trying to make you feel stupid—I'm at the top of the list. I sent them back my signed version of the contract, but never received a signed copy back. Even though I've been told that this still stands as proof of a contract, I would feel much better having the signed copy. So make sure that you ask for this first before anything else when you republish. Interesting—I never had to ask my new company CCB Publishing for a copy. It was sent to me immediately, and after I signed it, a copy was returned to me quickly with the owner's signature.
New book share
This week, our group member Sharon Licht's new book was released. I asked Sharon to tell us about it.
MAGIC MARMALADE A Tale of the Moonlight Fairies by Sharon E. Licht
Magic Marmalade is a new and exciting story about a little girl who wanders into an enchanted woods and discovers a magical world of fairies and elves and a place where dreams come true. This book is perfect for children of all ages. Anyone intrigued by fairies, elves, adventure, magic, and happy endings will adore this story. Description: Soft cover, 84 page book, 7 - 1/2" x 8 - 1/2", written in rhymed verse, with full color illustrations by Artist James Browne.

The book was written by Sharon E. Licht, a local Bucks County, PA writer who has penned this delightful story for the enjoyment of young and old alike.

Books can be ordered on the web at:
http://catawbapublishing.com/ Bookstore, Children's Books or through the author by sending email to: caganne@verizon.net Please type book order in subject line. PayPal is the preferred payment method. Money orders also accepted. Price is $20.00 each plus the cost of shipping when ordering through the author.

We all wish you the best of luck, Sharon. All of our authors can appreciate the hard work that goes into producing a book, and when you see it come to fruition, it's a most exciting moment to be celebrated.
If you have a new book out that you would like to share with the group, please feel free to share it with me.
Have a good week, and please feel free to send me any issues or questions you have.
With love and hope,
Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MARCH 29, 2008

2008-03-29T17:15:00.003-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MARCH 29, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

Welcome to our four new members. We now have 427 members of our group. I am not actively soliciting new people, but they are finding us on the Internet when they try to call Airleaf and the phones/websites are down. We are happy to help any victims who find our group.

I am not actively soliciting new members because this group is now large enough to bring about enough action with the membership we have. Some of you have been with me since my earliest organizing days back in August 2007. You have taken all the steps to get this case moving, moving, moving—and it is moving! I am in touch with both the civil authorities and federal authorities, and I have confidence that we will see some justice in the near future. When we do, I'll be traveling to Indiana hoping to meet some other authors who will join me for any legal court proceedings. I am a big believer in the accused having to meet their accusers, so I am hoping that as many of you as possible will be joining me. I will keep you posted as soon as any of this is taking place.

Our efforts in pursuing justice are very important because there are other companies out there are who practicing predatory publishing. This means that there are new victims all the time. It is my intention for our group to serve as a warning to anyone who thinks that he/she is above the law when it comes to publishing fraudulence. Too many of our authors are kind and trusting souls who were victimized once and now find themselves being victimized again. If you are in that situation, please write to me because I am compiling this new information and helping authors retrieve back their money. Please feel free to write to me before you make any decisions about republishing your book if you want my honest input and research. I'm happy to help you. As I have stated before, I don't want to do anything publicly to divert the attention away from our goal of seeing justice with the Airleaf case. However, privately and behind the scenes I am more than happy to help. Once our Airleaf case is resolved, then I will feel more willing to stop any other criminals who are participating in this unconscionable crime.

The requests for forming a co-op for our group continue to come in. I will work on this in May when I have some vacation time coming from my job. If you have any ideas you would like to share, please send them to me, and when the time comes, I'll notify our "co-op group" as to the suggestions.

Gayla Swint from Fideli Publishing called me to let authors know that Fideli is offering to copyright authors' books for the cost of the copyright even if they are published by another company. The cost for copyrighting is $45.00. Here is an interesting tidbit. Airleaf claimed they were "copyrighting" our books. I looked in my book and saw that it says "Copyright 2006." So after Gayla tipped me off, I went to the website from the Library of Congress and checked. I put the name of the book in, "Straight Wives: Shattered Lives." Well, it didn't really shock me to find that the book isn't listed at all as being copyrighted. To double check, I put in the name of a book published through a traditional publisher and the copyright came up immediately.

This means that there are publishers out there who are lying about getting your book copyrighted. Some of you have gone to companies that tell you that copyrighting is included in the publishing package. According to Gayla, you should receive a letter from the Library of Congress stating this. If you don't have a letter, this is a red flag. Take a moment to check your book in the link below to find out. If it's not there, your book is unprotected and anyone can copy it and say it is theirs. This is another publishing nightmare in the making. If you paid a company for this service and it has not been done when you check, call your company on Monday and demand that it be done or that the money is refunded to you for false advertising. Remember, an ISBN number is not the same as the copyright number.

Here's the link to check if your book is copyrighted:

Simple Search

If you would like to have your book copyrighted, write to Gayla at the following email address: sales@fidelipublishing.com. Fideli will charge you the $45.00 that it would cost you to do it, but they will do it for you and submit all the paperwork without charging you except for the cost. They are doing this as a service to try to help our authors so we are not victimized again.

Or you can do it yourself online if you prefer.

Here's the link to fill out the copyright work on your own:

U.S. Copyright Office

Authors are telling me that they are receiving their books and materials back from Bob Denton as well as Gayla Swint, both former Airleaf employees. Bob asked me to ask you to be patient because he is doing some of this work daily, but he still has a company to run, Mountain Valley Publishing Company, with deadlines to his own authors that he intends to meet. He plans to get to each request in the weeks ahead. If you have an emergency, write to him again and explain. He is being very accommodating in helping our victims. Gayla also has access to some of the books and may be calling you if she has yours to set up a way to return them to you.

In last week's update, I mentioned the website on Bob's website, Books4U, where you can see how your books are being distributed. This caused a lot of anguish to people who saw their books and felt even more helpless because they didn't know how to get the proceeds for them when they sell.

One of our victims wrote to his publisher, one of the major PODer's, about this and received this explanation that he said I could share with the group:

You have to remember that this is POD and, as such, a listing on a website is not an indication of sales or even of the book being stocked. What we have worked out with these distributors is that Ingram would carry a "virtual inventory" of 101 copies of your book so that it would not show an "out of stock" book, which would be an automatic deterrent to prospective buyers. I can understand the confusion, but I can assure you that since your book can be purchased very quickly, I doubt that any of these online retailers have any that are in actual stock.

What this says is that your book may be showing that it's available, but not be available at all. However, this is definitely a way for you to check if your book has been distributed as promised by companies who are selling you publishing packages promising it. If you see that your book is NOT there, then that means you have paid for a service that has not taken place. Let this site serve as a red flag for you.

As we are moving forward in the weeks ahead, I would like to promote our authors who have new books published. I think this is a great way for us to meet our fellow authors and see how diversified our genres are. If you would like to be included in this, please drop me a line with your book and information.

This week, I would like to send our heartfelt congratulations to Airleaf Victim Sarah Harrison, author of You Love Your Daddy, Don't You? A True Tragedy About Sexual Abuse. Sarah joined our group in January after waiting for a book that never came and continually emailing Carl Lau with no response. Due to the sensitive nature of the book, sexual incest, many people in the group where Sarah helps with counseling incest victims were waiting to get this book.

When Sarah and I first became acquainted in January, she shared with me a part of her book which I found horrifying based on her personal experience with incest from the time she was a young girl. As if she had not been victimized enough in her life, now her dream of helping others through her most difficult work of recreating this tragedy in book form had become another nightmare. Once again, Sarah was a victim and felt very defeated.

Sarah decided to publish her book with my new publisher, CCB Publishing. Her book was just released last week. This is the write up from her page on Amazon.com where you can order the book:

BOOK DESCRIPTION:

"Mama, something terrible is wrong with me. There is blood in my panties!"

Those were the words of seven-year-old Sarah. Mama told her she must have fallen or something and not to worry. Sarah went away feeling sad; her chance for help was gone!

It was Sarah's alter, Susie, who had been sticking pencils and other items in her private place. Susie had come when Sarah was only four years old. Susie had become Daddy's 'special' little girl by sitting on his lap. In return he gave her a dollar for any change she had.

Daddy played with Susie's pee pee and it was Susie that slept in the upstairs bedroom with her fourteen-year-old brother. Later in life, two other alters would appear.

You Love Your Daddy, Don't You? is told through the memories of Sarah. It reveals a child's determination to survive despite profound emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. This was compounded by constant neglect from both parents.

About the Author:
Sarah Harrison has written several articles for the Women's Institute for Incorporation Therapy's monthly newsletter as well as articles for spiritual magazines. She also volunteers as a mentor in a local school system, helps with special group activities in an assisted living home, and provides guidance to troubled parents and teens on www.experts.com.

After the death of her husband, Sarah Harrison moved from Atlanta, Georgia in 2007 to a suburb near Charlotte, North Carolina to be near her grandchildren. She has joined Harrison United Methodist Church and is active in Youth Group, Emmaus, Epiphany, and Faith Partners.

Sarah was so impressed by the services provided by CCB Publishing that she added her own testimonial to the others on the website. She wrote:

My name is Sarah Harrison, EDS. Having written my first book, "You Love Your Daddy, Don’t You?" In 2006, my goal was and still is to assist others who have suffered from child and sexual abuse in their lives.

The first attempt to publish my book with Airleaf was less than encouraging. They lied to me, took over $2,000.00 of my money and kept my manuscript for almost two years. I felt like giving up and never thought I’d ever see my book in print. However I had many friends and associates encouraging me, wanting to know when they could purchase my book.

This is when my friend, Bonnie Kaye, who has helped other Airleaf victims suggested contacting CCB Publishing. I am so grateful she did because it is like a dream to work with (the owner) Paul Rabinovitch. He renewed my enthusiasm and made me feel good about my book again. He understood my feelings and even helped me reword some phrases when I asked for his help.

When we converse by email, it never takes him longer than a couple of hours to reply even if it is just to say that he’s received my message and will get back to me in a timely manner.

I signed my contract in mid-February, and now before the end of March it is being printed. I have seen the first copy and am so delighted. It has been a true pleasure to work with Paul. CCB Publishing also allows its authors to have their books listed as “returnable” which encourages bookstores to purchase books. This is definitely an added advantage to us authors. I will recommend CCB Publishing to everyone I know.

In our efforts to promote our internal authors, please buy Sarah's compelling story. You can get it at Amazon.com or order it through her CCB website by clicking here:

Books by Sarah Harrison Sexual Child Abuse

Although I try to remain neutral throughout this mission, I feel compelled to tell our authors about the wonderful experience I had publishing my latest book with CCB Publishing. I think it's the best deal with the highest level of integrity and customer service. Please check the website at www.CCBPublishing.com to see for yourself.

If you have any books that have been printed in recent months and would like to share them with our group, please send me the information and I will share it with the group.

Please write to me if you have any questions or concerns.

Love, Bonnie

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MARCH 22, 2008

2008-03-23T11:08:00.002-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MARCH 22, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

Welcome to our new members of the group. As of today, we have 423 victims in our group who are victims of the largest predatory publishing scam in American history.

I am happy to share that a meaningful investigation is proceeding for our case. I have spoken to several law officials, and I feel reassured that there will be good news in the near future. This case is moving along thanks to all of you who took the time to diligently fill out the reports and send them to the proper authorities. There is power in numbers, and that is how we will be able to win this case. This case will send out a loud message to any other company or individual that believes that defrauding innocent victims goes unpunished.

A number of you have written to me to let me know that you are receiving back your disks and books from Bob Denton. Bob has opened up his own publishing company, Mountain Valley Publishing Company in Martinsville. In the past, I incorrectly accused him of being part of Airleaf's continuing business scam after it closed. I did send out a retraction of that statement immediately after I was corrected. Bob has been very helpful to us in our attempts to free our books that are being held hostage by Carl Lau in the Airleaf building. Since he has been flooded with over 100 requests, it may take him a couple of weeks to get to your request, but he is working daily to do this. Bob wanted to let you know that he is publishing books for people who want their books in print; however, he is not doing any marketing beyond putting the books on the traditional Internet sellers like Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

I would also like to mention that the ladies at Fideli Publishing, Robin Surface's group where Gayla Swint is now working, are also working to get back authors' books and work. You may be getting a call from them if they have retrieved your books and/or materials.

I would like to thank all of these former Airleaf employees who have decided to "do the right thing" in helping our authors retrieve their properties. It doesn't change the facts, but it helps with some of the hardships.

Remember—if Carl Lau contacts you to "sell" you back your books, say NO loud and clear and let me know.

There is one more interesting note about Bob Denton's website. He has placed a link called Bookfinder4U which can be found at: http://www.bookfinder4u.com. I found this site most informative. It tells you where your books are being sold on the Internet. I played around with it for a while, and I learned a lot about my own books. When you click into it, put your book name in there and you can find where your books are being distributed. The bad thing is that I haven't figured out how we will get the money if our Airleaf books do sell, but I will be pursuing that investigation in the near future.

I had a little over two dozen people respond to Chris Varga's idea last week about a print-on-demand author "co-op" venture. This was the idea where we could promote each other's books and buy other each other's books supporting the group and other POD authors. If you are interested in joining this venture, please email and let me know. We have so many diversified authors in our group with so many different types of genres that there is enough material to whet anyone's reading appetite.

I want to address the issue of a "class action" law suit since I get a few requests about that each week. One of our Airleaf victims suggested that I call an attorney he recommended in the Martinsville area. This attorney was kind enough to give me nearly an hour of his time to discuss the case. He confirmed for me what I learned from other lawyers that I have spoken to regarding our plight.

Basically, any legal action that we would take would cost money. When I say money, I mean thousands and thousands of dollars. Even if we could find a lawyer who is willing to take our case on a contingency basis, he would still require thousands of dollars for filing fees and investigation fees. If Airleaf was operating and making money like it was a year or two ago, it would be worth it because we could have won a case more easily. But by the time we started our group in August, the company was in the process of downsizing due to losing money. By October or November, the production at Airleaf was shut down, and almost every printing company dealing with Airleaf was on hold because of the outstanding bills. Employees were having their checks bounced and their health insurance stopped even though they were contributing for those benefits. The money was gone. Even though Carl Lau owns personal assets, we don't know how much is really available. He has other obligations besides ours that may take priority including the loan he took out last year for $216,000.00. According to the Morgan County courthouse, Airleaf has 12 tax issues on their records as well.

If we could be assured that investing money into a legal fund would guarantee us money in return, I'd be the first to participate and chip in; however, my fear is that we will all invest MORE money into Airleaf and still end up on the short end of the stick.

So, I think our best bet is to rely on the government agencies that are working on our case that will discover what there is as far as any assets visible or hidden. When the Attorney General's office files a civil case on our behalf, this will be requesting money for our losses. Bottom line—the lawyer agreed with me that with the complexities of this case and the lack of viable cash, we are taking the right route. If you have any further thoughts on this, please let me know.

Happy Easter to all of our Easter Airleaf Victims!

With love and hope,

Bonnie J

2008-03-15T13:16:00.001-04:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE 3/15/08

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

As of today, March 15, 2008, we have 421 members in our group. Welcome to our new members.

I have had a number of conversations this week concerning our case. All I can say at this time is that the wheels of justice are turning. In order not to compromise the case, I won't say more. However, for the first time, I am feeling optimistic that there is meaningful action going on.

I am asking for your help. Many of you have sent me back your surveys that have been very helpful. Sadly, due to my very busy season at work, I won't have the time to thoroughly go through all of the files for a few more weeks. In my attempt to help the authorities who are handling our case, I am asking you to send me a note if you were the victims in any of the following fraudulent Airleaf scams:

1. The Carnival Cruise that was never booked
2. The Frankford, Germany book fair
3. The London book fair
4. Kirkus Reviews from the winter of 2007
5. Ads in the NY Times and LA Times

If you paid for any of those promotions, would you be kind enough to email me even if you have sent me the hardcopies? Thank you.

A number of you emailed me that you sent letters to Bob Denton since he offered to return your books. Please keep me posted on how that is going. If you haven't heard back from Bob, feel free to call him at (765) 349-8908. He was very willing to help any Airleaf author retrieve his or her books, disks, and other materials—no strings attached.

Several of you wrote to me that Carl Lau has sent you back your disks and letters stating that your book rights are your own. One author wrote to me saying that Carl was willing to SELL him his books for $1.00 each. If you are getting those letters from Carl, please save them, let me know, and call Bob Denton instead. He is willing to give you your books for just the price of shipping. You can write to Bob at bdenton308@insightbb.com.

This is a friendly reminder to those of you who are getting books returned by Bob or who have surplus books to sell. You can take your books and sell them on Amazon and make back almost the entire cover cost. In order to do this, you must first register at www.Amazon.com. Then type in the title of your book. You will see the link for your book come up. When you click into your book title, next to your book, you will see the link that says: "See All Buying Options." In that box it will say, "Have one to sell?" Then you'll see a box under that saying, "Sell yours here." Click into the link and it will take you to the page where you can type in your information. When it states the "Condition of the book," you can put in "Authors Copy – Personally Autographed." I have sold over three dozen of my books that way in the past two months. If you need help with this, just email me and I'll walk you through the process if you are having a problem.

MARKETING TIP OF THE WEEK

Through our nightmare with Airleaf, one thing that we have learned is that it takes a lot of hard work to market your book. Many of us paid for marketing scams that produced nothing but a hole in our bank accounts. I get your notes saying, "I'm an author, not a marketer," which led you to Airleaf to start with. But as I keep trying to hit home, you need to take control of your book marketing, and there are some easy and inexpensive steps to doing so.

Last year, I was conducting free 2-hour workshops in Philadelphia on "How To Get Your Book Into Print" to help aspiring authors learn about the traditional and non-traditional routes of getting published. At one of my workshops, I had the pleasure of meeting a wonderful young author named Jennifer Gladden. Jennifer has her first children's book, "A Star in the Night" coming out this summer.

Jennifer is an INCREDIBLE marketer. I became part of her mailing list as she announced her progress. I was very impressed on how she is marketing herself and this is before the book is out! I asked her if she would write something for our group on how she does this step by step, and this is what she shared with us:

Network Brule: A Recipe for a Fine Networking Experience

You hear it all the time. Someone tells you that networking is as important to writing as the actual manuscript. You're told it is the key to publicity, which in turn is key to your sales. The message is always the same: "Get your name out there".

Okay. That's great advice. "But how do I do it?" you might ask. Successful networking is like creating that perfect Crème Brule. With one look, it seems impossible to do. Have no fear. A recipe follows that is sure to get you started on your networking experiences.

First, you need all the ingredients: websites, e-mail, blogs, social groups and professional organizations. Handle with care and attention. Then, follow these steps carefully:

Step One: The Base

Start a website and/or blog. Add a page about you, your works and your links. This will help you build a platform and make you more visible. When your book comes out, you've already started a reader base. It also makes it possible for future readers to learn about who you are.

Step Two: The Seasoning

Season with e-mail signatures. Carefully place your links in the bottom of your e-mails. Now, every time an e-mail goes out, so do your links. Many times when you least expect it, someone will see your link and visit your site. If they like it, they may even pass on the link to a friend.

Step Three: The Flavor
Visit other blogs and websites. This helps you get ideas to flavor your own sites. In addition, leave a comment. Often the blog owner will visit your link in return. There you go. One more person knows about you. They may even want to exchange links with you.

Step Four: The Sugar

Sweeten your experience by joining online listservs such as Yahoo Groups or Google Groups. Choose groups with the same writing interests as you. You'll make many friends. Visit their sites. Ask if anyone's interested in a link exchange where you'll put their link on your site and vice versa. In fact, most of my contacts came from social groups.

Step Five: An Added Touch

Enhance the pot with professional writing organizations such as The Author's Guild or if you're a children's author the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. You can meet fellow authors or other important contacts through sites like these. Many organizations have writing conferences where you don't just learn about your craft, you're meeting other writers and editors.

Mix everything together. Garnish by serving business cards, complete with your name and website, at conferences. Keep them handy when you go out. You never know who you may run into.

Like creating that perfect Crème Brule, these steps might not seem like much by themselves. However, together you have a recipe for a fine networking experience.

Here is Jennifer's bio:

Jennifer Gladen lives and writes for children in Philadelphia. Her short stories and articles have appeared in Stories for Children Magazine. Her future publications include three articles to appear in Once Upon a Time Magazine. In addition, her first children's book, A Star in the Night, will be released this summer. To learn more about Jennifer and her work, visit any of her links:
www.jennifergladen.com
http://jgladen.blogspot.com
http://www.authorsden.com/jennifergladen
http://jengladensmusingswordpress.com/

Thank you, Jennifer for sharing with our readers. If you have a chance, please visit her sites to see how networking really works!
Another good idea came from our fellow Airleaf victim, Chris Varga. He wrote:
Bonnie,

Thanks for trying to assist me and the others. Unless my books actually sold and I just wasn't told, I don't need to put up a big fight about getting my fee back. I've been learning from publishing mistakes for 5 years.

I guess the image of the reclusive writer sitting alone in his mansion on the mountain is a thing of the past, if it ever really existed. I did not pay as much for "publicity" as some of the other victims, since I already knew that free publicity or in-person connections are the best way to go.

When I got the letters offering a $5000 "bestseller" package, I scoffed. Most traditional published books with publicity paid by the publisher are lucky to earn $5000 in royalties so fast (could be about 5000 books with author receiving $1 per book). Right now, the odds are staggered and I'd advise people to rent a beach house for two weeks with their $2000. They'll get much more enjoyment out of it.

I also, from reading reviews and traveling around the internet, have found that for most American consumers, knowing a book is self-published is an automatic, unconditional disqualification. They won't even read one chapter if you paid them. It's kind of ironic when you think of how the self-publishers praise themselves. If the attitudes of the American public changes, then maybe struggling writers will have a shot. But right now, I don't see things going that way.

If we really want to help each other, one idea is to build a network of struggling writers or former self-published authors. I've already bought over 20 self-published books by authors I never heard of, just to support the cause.

Just an added note, the Authorhouse website claims that over 30,000 authors have published with them. I'm sure the big companies like Infinity, Xlibris, and others have at least 10,000 each. That's a lot of people who probably made little to no money off their hopes. I think the business of self-publishing started out with noble intentions, but then got turned into a bad rap and now it just seems to be getting out of control.

Personally, I would be open to having gatherings of self-published authors by geographical region. Constructive criticism and feedback from people who understand is important, especially since success at writing takes persistence and dealing with rejection from "the mainstream".

Also, the thousands of victims have to each have at least one close family member, friend, or significant other. It seems like a big hurdle to overcome, but I would be willing to assist spread the word and remind the public of the respect creativity and freedom of speech once had.

Chris Varga
"A Frightful Move"

I think Chris has a great idea. It's so important for us to support each other. It would be great if we could start a support group for each other where we can buy each other's books and spread the word to our own network. We have such a richly diverse group of writers with so many different genres. If you would be interested in joining me in this venture, let me know. If we have enough of a positive response, I will propose several ways that we can do this to help each other.
Have faith, my fellow victims. All of your hard work to put this case together will pay off in the near future.
With love and great hope,
Bonnie 

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE MARCH 8, 2008

2008-03-08T16:22:00.002-05:00

Airleaf Victims Update – March 8, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

As of today, we have 420 members in our group. We welcome our new members.

This week, I contacted the Attorney General's office about the second hard copy of the complaint form that some of us were receiving. A number of you wrote to me stating you never received a hard copy at all. I planned to copy my form and send it to you, but I thought I would write to the Assistant AG, Tom Irons, to ask him first if the form had to be an original, and if so, how would they get one. Tom was very clear that the form had to be an original from their office which is why I didn't send out copies to some of you who requested them. Tom then referred me to paralegal Raven Bobbio, who has been compiling our records since October, for further clarification when I couldn't understand how this whole procedure worked. Here is how the correspondence went:

Ms. Kaye:

Please inform Airleaf consumers that if they have filed a complaint online and receive a hard copy from our office please sign and return the copy with any paperwork (i.e. contract, payment information, etc.). If the consumer filed a complaint online, but did not receive a hard copy, they need not send in any other form. The consumer should receive an opening letter form our office acknowledging their complaint. Bottom line, we need at least one complaint and any relevant paperwork.

Raven Bobbio

Paralegal to Deputy Attorney General Tom Irons

This information seemed confusing to me. I didn't understand it. Why would some people receive a form after filing on line and not others? So I asked:

Dear Raven,

A number of our people filed on line as you know. Please clarify this for me so I can let the group know.

1. Some of the people that filed on line received the original hard copy of a complaint to send back to your attention. Since that time, some, including me, have received a SECOND hard copy form. Am I correct in understanding that the SECOND hard copy form does NOT have to be sent back to you if the first one was sent back?

2. Some of our people that filed on line have NOT received a hard copy from you. They have not signed a form since they never received one. Do you want me to gather those names for you so you can send them a hard copy?

Thank you for your help.

Bonnie Kaye

This was the response:

In a message dated 3/5/2008 10:40:16 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, Raven.Bobbio@atg.in.gov writes:

1. Send all copies back signed with paperwork.

2. If the consumers who filed online received a file opening letter, they do not need to do anything further.

Okay, I was still confused. I wrote back:

Hi Raven,

So if I've already sent back the hard copy with my documentation, I have to send back the SECOND hard copy form?

Also, what is a file opening letter?

Thanks.

Bonnie

Her response:

Ms. Kaye:

I am not sure where the confusion is in translation, but will try to explain again. If a consumer has sent one complaint form in to our office, signed with documents, you do not need to send anything further until it is requested. A file opening letter is a letter explaining you have an open file with our office and acknowledging your complaint. I apologize, but due to the limited time we are given to serve thousands of consumers, I will have to cut short our email here. Thank you for your patience in the matter.

So, that's the situation. If you haven't received any confirmation of your file opening letter or a hard copy sent to your home to verify it, please feel free to contact Ms. Bobbio directly at the following address if you would like to verify that your complaint is there and if you have to take any further action: Raven.Bobbio@atg.in.gov

And, yes, I do admit I am still confused. I don't know why some of us received two hard copy forms to fill out, others received one, and still others received none. But then again, I'm still confused as to why Carl Lau is still a free man while our money, books, and materials are still being held hostage. That's me—just confused!

Detective Buskirk will send us an update this week. He has been very ill but is on the mend. We all wish him a speedy recovery. He assured me that he is spending every moment possible on our case.

One of our authors sent me this note:

Are there any victims who are California residents, in particular in the SF Bay Area? There is an organization called either Bay Area or California Lawyers for the Arts that will take on cases like this pro bono, especially one of such magnitude. I would
think they would also agree to take it as a class-action type case.

Contact any Bay Area residents on the list and have them start the ball rolling.

David

If any of you are in the Bay Area and would like me to connect you to David to see what can be done, please email me, and I'll put you in touch.

One of our authors, Anthony, sent me this note:

Bonnie once again, you gave us some great information. On the whole website thing, I've been getting a lot of traffic on MySpace, plus I'm a member of blackplanet.com and a few other online communities. This is a great way to promote and network, plus best of all it's FREE.

MySpace is an excellent way to advertise your books for free by setting up your own page that can be changed at any time. You can view the site at www.MySpace.com. I am sending you the link to my page on MySpace which I admit that I don't keep up with due to lack of time. I also admit I am clueless how to put the page together, but I have someone who put mine together which shows you my books. Many people visit the MySpace sites, so it certainly is a good way to get free publicity for your work. As with the websites, I have people who can design your MySpace account for a minimal fee if you can't do it yourself. Feel free to drop me a line, and I'll refer you to them.

Thank you, Anthony, for this good lead.

Link to Bonnie's MySpace page:

MySpace.com - Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed. - 56 - Female - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania -

Our author Cliff Crow sent me this note in response to last week's discussion about "Return Policies" that book companies offer:

Hi Bonnie,

I would like to add a bit about what you reported on the “return policy” being offered by Xlibris and others. I realize this is probably not news to you, but you can pass this information on to the group if you think it would be helpful.

One side note: Xlibris published my book, and did an excellent job of it. The price was very reasonable, and it included packages, which I feel sure they went through with it, but that did not sell books. The main problem with Xlibris is that they decide what your book should sell for, and make their big money by selling you your own book. They chose a selling price of $21.99 for my 200 page paperback book. Including freight, I had to pay just under $10.00 each to buy copies of my book, and had to buy 500 copies to get that price.
Book Return Policy

For bookstores to be able to return books is a must if you expect them to buy, but this is also a great way for your publisher to get more of your money. Being needed, it is easy to talk people into buying this extra program. But buying this policy will usually not make any difference in the final results. IT DOES NOT SELL BOOKS!

The good news is that they can return books. The bad news is that they will! Without that policy, your book has to be a “special order” situation in most cases. With this policy, the store (using either the name of the book or ISBN number) can order your book while placing their daily or weekly book orders.

They will order books for book signings (often times more than needed because they can return them) and we love it. Unfortunately the book stores (especially the big ones) have been spoiled by this policy. They will order in 25 books for a signing, knowing that is more than enough. Everyone is so pleased when you sell 14 books at the signing. During an inventory a week or so later, they still have not sold any more books, so as per their normal policy, they return the remaining 11 books. One manager, responsible for two stores, brought in 40 books. I sold a total of 20. The remaining 20 were returned.

For unknown authors, getting books to sell is difficult. In most stores your book will just be put on a shelf, so very little of the book is showing. Even though my book, AFTER THE DIET’S OVER, was about diets, and could be useful to almost everyone, getting it to sell is difficult. Back in 2002 I placed two books in a store. I re-visited that store a short time ago. The books are still on the shelf. Months ago 19 of 19 Waldenbook stores that I visited were excited about my book, and they all bought. Many sold, but many were returned. I still feel that if Airleaf had done their job, things might have been different. My point here is that getting them excited was easy because of the return policy. It was also easy to get them to order, but I would have lost money if I had paid extra for that policy.

Another problem may show itself. If you do get a return policy, please try to control, and keep to a reasonable number, how many of books the stores order. An exaggeration, but if you have 150 books in stock, and you get word from the book distributor that they have sold out, you will no doubt be happy and excited. You order another printing. Then after having paid out more money, most of those books show up again. Five stores brought in 30 books (they loved it and are sure it will sell); a few weeks later returned what was left.

Two last concerns:

I do not understand why in their letter they say, “They can always return the unsold books to us and process a refund without affecting your sales or revenue from those books they have ordered.”
Their policy appears to allow people to return the books to THEM (Xlibris). NO bookstore can afford to order books from Xlibris, and most do not! So exactly what will you be paying for? If it does not allow books to be returned to companies like Ingram and Baker & Taylor, it is useless, even if they GIVE it to you.

That’s it!

Cliff

Thanks, Cliff for your sharing your personal experience.

As I said last week, paying large sums of money to companies like Authorhouse and Xlibris for a return policy is throwing away your money. That's why when seeking to republish your book or publish future books you need to ask those important questions. I mentioned last week, my new publishing company, CCB Publishing, is very reasonable in offering a return policy for $100.00. In addition, you can buy copies of your book for $2.00 over the cost of actual printing, which is usually in the $4.00 range for most paperbacks under 200 pages. This means if you want to buy your own copies for selling at events, you can make a nice profit for yourself. With a company such as iUniverse, your discount off the sales price of your book can range from 40% off for 20 – 99 books to 50% for 250 – 499 books. So if your book sells for $20.00, this means you can buy copies for $12.00 each for less than 99 books, $11.00 each (45%) when ordering 100 – 249 copies, and $10.00 each for over 250 books. With CCB, I'm paying approximately $6.00 a book no matter how many copies I buy, so you can see the difference in the profit you can make.

As a side issue, iUniverse offers royalties at 20% over the price of printing, shipping, and other charges. On a book that costs $20.00, if someone buys it online at Amazon or BN.com, you are looking at a 20% split of profits after the standard 55% discount. This means the starting price is really $9.00. Take off the printing cost and you're at $5.00. Take 20% of that and you royalty payment is $1.00. Need I say more? One of the big pulls for us when we went to Airleaf was that we were promised a 50% split on the royalties. Of course, for most people, 50% of nothing still translated into nothing.

Not all authors have the same publishing needs, which is why you owe it to yourself to do a thorough check on what a company is REALLY offering you. When I was seeking a new publisher after the Airleaf horror, I went through a list online compiled by Clea Saal, author of the Incomplete Guide to POD Publishers that compared companies. I narrowed my search based on what I thought would be the right company for me, and then I called four of the companies that seemed to make sense and interviewed them at length. There were a few companies that seemed reputable (after doing hours of research online), but I went with CCB Publishing. This has been the best publishing experience for me as well as other Airleaf victims who have decided to publish with a company that is an author's dream as far as integrity, price, and book printing timelines go. There is also a 50% royalty split which is greater than iUniverse and similar companies, and authors actually get accurate sales accounts and royalty checks ON TIME. You can view the website at www.CCBPublishing.com, or feel free to contact me if you need more information. If you have found another book publishing company and you would like me to do some preliminary research for you, feel free to let me know. I have checked out other companies for some of you, finding the little "loopholes" that I have learned to become familiar with.

Our Airleaf victim and my friend, Ken Pullen, sent a wake-up letter to our group. I have condensed it for this update, but you can read his full comments on our Airleaf Victims blog under the comments section from last week. Here's what Ken says:

Bonnie - and to the other 410;

I realize in our culture, with human nature being what it is, people do not want to think or believe anyone offering a service would do so just to take their money and not deliver, or not deliver corresponding to the fee paid.

I just want to say this - and hopefully you can convey this to all 412 people duped, conned, lied to, swindled, and taken advantage of by Airleaf Publishing...

NO SELF PUBLISHING SOLICITOR OR COMPANY WILL DO FOR YOU WHAT YOU BELIEVE THEY WILL, THINK THEY WILL, OR WHAT THEY PROMISE TO DO FOR YOU. NOT ONE OF THEM. PERIOD.

I can be objective about myself, my motivations, and my actions. More of us need to be objective and to the bone honest with ourselves. I attempted to by-pass the traditional publishing route because of the time frame involved in that process. It takes years unless a person possesses the genius and art of crafting words of a Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Uptown, Irving, or Vonnegut.

So in my arrogance - yes arrogance - I deemed myself a writer and was determined to get published. Oh, what I had to write people would want to read I thought to myself. I have written for years, and was even told by some in the movie industry - the REAL movie industry when I lived in Los Angeles, not the pretend movie industry Carl Lau fabricated and lied to everyone about - that I was good, that I had talent, and to keep at it. Well, at that point I'd been writing screenplays for 7 years without getting paid a dime. I might have made it and not be writing this to you today if I'd have stuck it out another 4, 5, 6, or 7 years. I might be in some great house on the beach in Malibu - but after 7 years I was tired. Point is people - nothing of quality or value comes easy or fast. Do not be duped by claims that you or your book are so special...please send us MONEY immediately and we'll provide you with personalized attention and make you a success. It's all bull feces--huge enormous piles of bull feces. If you want to fall into it, step into it...well keep on the course you are. Fail to be objective about yourself, your situation, or what people are really like in the world.

I had no grand illusions. I did not imagine myself becoming rich or famous or both, but I was arrogant enough, egotistical enough to believe I could eke out a moderate return.

Do not tell me none of you fit this profile, or you all had the most benign and innocent of expectations. You publish to sell books. Period. You expect to sell books and to make some money from it. Well, do not venture into the realm of ANY SELF PUBLISHING ENTERPRISE.

Why do I say this? I've been burned and experienced multiple horrendous experiences in the self publishing arena. Airleaf Publishing is not my only experience with liars, thieves, those with silky buttery tongues making all manner of promises about what they'll do specifically for me because my book is so special...why, it's been chosen they all proclaim! Of course it has. Because we appear to these vipers like a blind one-legged rodent and they know we are easy prey--prime for the picking.

It's very simple really. If you fail to learn you're doomed to repeat your mistakes. Losing and failure should teach us not to go down those paths again, and yet week after week I read nothing but how desperate people are so they turn to more of the same, convinced it's going to be better or different. It won't be. Believe me.

Airleaf Publishing was a con game. Carl Lau was no different than the shyster that pulled into the dusty town in a wagon 130 years ago and sold colored alcohol in bottles from the back of that wagon to the clueless clamoring masses. And the next month a different guy pulled into that same town with a different label and the people didn't learn a thing and bought more garbage from a different con man. They didn't learn.

People are no different today. The "snake oil" being sold now though is in the form of fame and riches and getting your writing published in book form, or on the Internet. Yet it's no different at all from some con man pulling into your present town and trying to sell you colored miracle water from the back of his beat up pickup truck. Wise up people. Self publishing (promotion) is a con game.

Do not be fooled. Do not be so desperate. Be honest. Don't place your daily life in jeopardy because you can't pay your bills, or you've spent your life savings, or you throw money at these vipers to make them rich while you don't have adequate food, shelter, or what have you.

NO SELF PUBLISHING HOUSE HAS HIGHLY READ HIGH SALES BOOK IN THEIR STABLE OF BOOKS. NONE HAVE BESTSELLERS OF ANY KIND. Do your research and homework people. Your present financial stability and peace of mind...and your future depends on your becoming attuned, smart, and aware...

Hopefully we'll all begin making better choices...and choose wisely for a change.

Thank you.

So, like Ken is saying, take a giant swig of humility before you invest in publishing promotions that add up to nothing more than heartache and disappointment.

That's the news of the week. I hope to have something more concrete next week from Captain Buskirk and the FBI. Don't lose the faith—and keep up the fight!

Love, Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update March 1, 2008

2008-03-01T09:25:00.002-05:00

MARCH 1, 2008 AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

Welcome to our new members. We are now a group of 412 authors who are seeking restitution and retribution for the fraudulence done to us by Airleaf Publishing and members of its staff.

A number of you received a second form at home from the Attorney General's office. I contacted Tom Irons, our representative, and asked him if a third report had to be filled out. The first was on line; the second was a hard copy sent to your home. His response to me was:

Bonnie:

On the complaint issue, we need to have a signed copy of the complaint. As long as the author has sent in a “signed” copy, not just a complaint form filled out, they can disregard the yellow form (the signature assures us the author’s claims are true, under penalty of perjury-akin to an affidavit).

Tom
This means if you already sent back one form that was sent to your home, you do NOT have to send in this second form.

I appreciate all of the surveys that have been returned to me to date. If you haven't sent yours in or you're having a problem with it, please let me know. This information has been very valuable already in helping me prepare information for the various government agencies which will need them in moving forward with our case.

I am seeking your help with transactions that took place between the time period of November 2007 and December 2007 when Airleaf closed (December 21, 2007). I contend that the remaining staff at Airleaf knew that there was no way they could deliver on any promises because the production staff was gone and the printers were holding our books hostage for non-payment. Some of you were solicited for publishing and promotions throughout this period and paid for work during this time frame. If you were one of these victims, please let me know the circumstances and amount you paid as well as who you were working with. This includes offers of selling back your own books to you at a discount price.

I have no specific news for you this week; however, I feel confident that there is movement in our case. Please be patient. I did ask Captain Buskirk for an update but haven't heard from his this week. I told him that we are frustrated as far as getting back files and books. I'll write to him again on Monday.

Some of you suggested that I write to the Indiana Bar Association asking them for help. This week, I wrote first to the Indiana Legal Services asking them for help with a pro-bono lawyer. This was the response:

Ms. Kaye,
Generally Indiana Legal Services does not take cases that would result in a monetary settlement. However, you can contact your local legal service office and see if there is some way that we could assist. To locate your local legal service office, go to our web site, www.indianajustice.org and click on the "Find Legal Help". Put your county in the search box and all legal service offices that support Martinsville will come up with contact information.
Another option is to contact your local bar association president. She or he could provide a referral to a private attorney. This attorney would not be free but may be willing to take your case. You can find the bar association president on the same list from our web site.

Victoria Deak, Esq., Project Director
Access to Justice Project Indiana Legal Services, Inc.
www.indianajustice.org

I then wrote back to Ms. Deak explaining that I am not an Indiana resident and received this response:

Ms. Kaye,

If you use the web site and contact the referrals from the bar association perhaps you could do this by phone. Indiana Legal Services also does phone intake. The listings on the web site have the times and days that phone intake occurs. Your other option is to request someone from Indiana to make the contact.

Victoria Deak, Esq., Project Director

A special thank you goes to Ms. Deak who responded within an hour of my request early on a Sunday morning. This is truly a woman who cares about helping others.

I am still pursuing an attorney to do a class action suit, and I requested help from the Indiana Bar Association with no response as of yet. My friend Patty brought up a good suggestion for some of you who are in Indiana that I researched. If you live in Indiana, you may want to think about filing a claim in the small claims court. You can file a complaint if the value of your claim is up to $6,000.00. You don't need legal representation for this, and the cost of filing the claim is relatively inexpensive. I will try to reach the Morgan County Small Claims Court this week to see what we can do to file out-of-town claims with them. If you have tried this already, please let me know so I can share with others the results. If you live in Indiana and want information on how to do this or who to contact, please write to me and I'll send you the information that I have checked out.

This week, I would like to talk to you about information on what is referred to as a "Bookstore Return Policy."

One of our authors, Willard Gray, received this letter from Xlibris and asked my advice:

I have a very good marketing strategy that will give a greater chance for your book to be available in the physical bookstore, We call this Bookstore Returnability Program wherein your book will be listed under i-page (the latest software that all of the resellers/bookstores are using to check for new and returnable books). 30 biz days once the book is published your book is already listed under i-page so there is a greater chance that bookstores or reseller will just directly acquire or order your book because they can always return the unsold books to us and process a refund without affecting your sales or revenue from those books that they have ordered. Also you can go to any of the bookstore that you want and present this Bookstore Returnability Program for them to acquire your book. This is only $699 that you can pay using installment plan of $243/mo for 3 mos. This is good for 1 year and after a year bookstores/resellers will be given within 6 months for then to return the unsold copies of the book for refund. This is a very good hassle free marketing strategy. Thank you and have a wonderful day.

A number of authors have asked me about this because some of the more prominent book companies including AuthorHouse and Xlibris charge $599.00 or $699.00 for this package—FOR ONE YEAR!! Yikes! That's a lot of money, and especially when you understand what this means.

When I first heard about this return policy a couple of years ago, I found it exciting because it gave authors the ability to go to major bookstores for signings. Most major bookstores don't allow print-on-demand book authors to have book signings because if they order books and the books don't sell, they can't return them to the publisher and they are stuck with them. So a return policy was devised by some of the larger POD companies as a carrot to dangle in the faces of uneducated consumers—like us—to serve as an enticement.

By now, most of you know the reality of how much you can make on a book sale. Let's review the formula. If you have a book that sells for $14.99, book distributors such as Amazon.com get a 55% discount on the retail price. That means $8.24 comes off the book to begin with. That leaves you with $6.75 as your starting point. Take away the cost of printing of an average book of 175 page book of approximately $4.50, and you are now left with $2.24 per book. Even if you are receiving a 50/50 split with your POD company, you are looking at $1.12 for each book. As I warn all of you, it takes a lot of book sales to make back your initial investment of publishing, especially if you are paying big fees for special promotions.

Even if the profit percentage is somewhat higher at a bookstore because the discount ranges at approximately 40% instead of 55%, and even if you make $4.00 a book in profits, how many books do you have to sell to recoup your initial investment? The answer is A LOT. Unless you have a large local fan base or a book that is a hot topic, it will be very difficult to recoup that loss.

After my Airleaf nightmare, as I explored where to go from there for my upcoming book that came out in December, I researched over 40 different POD companies to see which one would meet my personal needs. There is no ONE solution to all of our publishing needs. I found a publisher, CCB Publishing, which met my needs, as well as a number of other Airleaf victims, for publishing. The website is at www.CCBPublishing.com. One of the many selling points for me was that I could buy a return policy for $100.00 a year. This seemed reasonable. It gives me the ability to do book signings and at least feel that I have a chance of recouping any investment.

To be sure that I was on the right track, I asked our expert advisor Victoria Strauss if I was accurate in my assessment. I wrote to her:

Hi Victoria,
I tell my authors who ask me about return policies from companies like AuthorHouse and Xlibris that charge 599.00 or 699.00 that this is a waste of money. It would take the selling of hundreds of books to make up for that each year. Do you think that is correct advice? I don't see where it can pay off for almost any author unless he/she is traveling around the country setting up book signings on a topic that is going to sell that many books. Please let me know if you think I'm right.
Bonnie

Here is Victoria's response:

Hi, Bonnie,
I do think you're right about this service not being worth the expense. Returnability might make some stores more willing to place orders--especially larger stores--but there are no guarantees, and as you say, writers would have to sell a lot of books to make back the extra expense. Given the average sales of books from these companies (less than 200), it is unlikely to be worth it for most authors.
Victoria

On another note, a number of you have recently written to me about special promotions that you are receiving for book marketing. These packages start at $750.00 and go as high as $3,500.00. Once again, do the math. See how many books you have to sell to make back this money.

Some of these promotions include placement on a POD website. Many of you are excited by that prospect. In reality, the only people who go to those websites are you and the other potential buyers of POD services. Some of you believe that at least your book can be seen on the Internet on a website. So here's a solution to you that is far more cost effective.

I have worked with some of you on obtaining your own websites. The best bargain in town can be found at Register.com. This is where I purchased some of my domain names including AirleafVictims.com. For $35.00, you can buy a domain name for a year. For that same $35.00, Register.com will give you a FREE one page website where you can advertise your book for no additional hosting fee. This is an excellent deal! If you have any computer savvy, you can design your own website for free. If you are like me, and you don't have that ability, you can find someone to do it for you. My web person for our Airleaf Victims website charges $200.00 for setting up your one page site with a link to your book and where it can be bought. She would be happy to work with any of our Airleaf Victims for that price. If you are interested in doing this, let me know. I can walk you through the steps of getting your own domain name and setting up your account. Then I can refer you to my webmaster if you would like her to do your site.

Talking about websites, I meant to tell you another way that Airleaf made money from authors. I recently found out from an author that he was paying $250.00 a month to be positioned on the first row of the Airleaf website. This was really disturbing to me. If any of you were paying for website positioning, please let me know. I'd like to add that to my research.

A few people have written to me recently about tracking down former Airleaf employee Gayla Swint. Gayla is now working with Fideli Publishing owned by former Airleaf employee Robin Surface. Some of you have written to me about the positive relationships you had with these women as well as other Fideli staff members. You can write to Gayla at gdswint@yahoo.com. She is happy to hear from any of her previous authors that she worked with. If you are seeking other former Airleaf employees, please let me know, and I'll do my best to track them down for you.

Have a good week and feel free to write to me about any questions or issues I can help you with.

With love and hope,

Bonnie

2008-02-23T10:34:00.007-05:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE FEBRUARY 23, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

As of today, we have 408 Airleaf Victims in our group. Welcome to our new members.

Tonight and tomorrow evening on the History Channel, you can watch our own Jack Powell in a special on Hillbillys--The Real Story hosted by Billy Ray Cyrus. It's a fascinating documentary which will teach you about a little known part of our country's history. It airs tonight at 8:00 p.m. Check your local listings.

First, I want to thank you, as a group, for taking the time to write to Indiana's U.S. Attorney Timothy Morrison last weekend and throughout the week. I want to go over his response to us to clarify where he stands and where we as a group stand.

Last weekend, I sent Mr. Morrison this email before I asked you to do the same:

From: BonKaye@aol.com [mailto:BonKaye@aol.com]
Sent: Saturday, February 16, 2008 12:23 PM
To: USAINS-Webmaster
Subject: From Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed., Organizer Airleaf Victims

Dear Mr. Morrison,

I am respectfully requesting that your office communicate with me as the organizer of our group of 405 authors in the Airleaf Victims group. My website is at www.AirleafVictims.com.

I had originally been in touch with Steve DeBrota, but my phone calls for the past two weeks are going unreturned. Perhaps he is no longer on the case.

Please let me know if your office is assisting our victims who have been taken in excess of one million dollars by the fraudulent practices of Carl Lau and Airleaf Publishing. You can check with the FBI and Postal authorities through Captain Jeff Buskirk in Martinsville, Indiana, who has put our case together.

We are very distraught at the responses of the Indiana government agencies including the Attorney General's office, the Governor's office, and the two State Senator offices. We are frustrated and would like to know how you can help us.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely, Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.

Organizer, Airleaf Victims

Here was his response on Tuesday, February 19, 2008:

Dear Ms. Kaye:

This matter has not yet been referred to our office by any law enforcement agency. We have seen no reports nor results of any interviews. We are not an investigative unit but are dependent upon work-ups by groups like the FBI and the Postal Inspection Service, both whom you have involved in this.

The Assistant United States Attorney you contacted, Steve DeBrota, was the duty attorney for the office on the day you called. He is not assigned this case, because, as I explained above, no investigative agency has referred it to us. Your telephone calls have been unreturned for the past few weeks, because Mr. DeBrota has been committed to a multi-victim, child exploitation case in the northern part of our district. That case was referred to us and prosecution has commenced.

I am sure the Governor, the Indiana Attorney General, and the offices of Senators Bayh and Lugar are also “distraught.” None of these entities have any criminal jurisdiction in Indiana. The only entities that do—and have relevance here—is the Morgan County, Indiana, Prosecuting Attorney and our office. What can these offices you contacted do for you?

I hope that this group has retained counsel to sue the responsible parties and attempt to seize any relevant assets prior to adjudication on the merits. The burden of proof is lower than in a criminal prosecution and speed of initiation of suit can be faster. Furthermore, restitution is more limited under the criminal law. A successful criminal prosecution will not result in restitution for lost profits.

Finally, your ability to marshal an e-mail campaign that fills our webpage mailbox with more than 120 e-mails may be impressive but unproductive. One referred to me as Attorney General and castigated me for failing to return your calls. I have never spoken to you and I am not the Attorney General. Another told me his books were printed and shipped, but 100 of them were defective. (This is more evidence of breach of contract than criminal fraud) Consolidated communication will save time. Feel free to distribute this e-mail to your group.

We will work through this as we are provided with sufficient information.

Sincerely,

Timothy M. Morrison, Acting U.S. Attorney

I felt somewhat "stung" by this response. I thought it was petty of Mr. Morrison to bring up two insignificant points of being referred to as the AG and the defective books. Instead, I would have liked for him to note that he was very saddened to hear about the fraudulence that our group had been part of and that he would do whatever he could to check this for us. Instead, he was asking me what the offices we contacted could do for us.

He acknowledged that my phone calls had not been returned because the attorney on duty was assigned to a more pressing case. I can understand that—but all it takes is communication to relay that. A call back from his department explaining this would have been sufficient and avoided the mass emails. I am not a party of one calling on my own behalf—I am representing a group of over 400 people who are looking for answers.

Mr. Morrison made the comment that restitution is more limited under criminal law, suggesting we find an attorney to sue for us. This was my response that I sent to him later that day:

Dear Mr. Morrison,

Thank you for your quick response to the Airleaf Victims. Quite frankly, we are very disgusted and frustrated at this point. Other than the police captain in Martinsville, Captain Jeff Buskirk, we have heard virtually no news about our case for over six months. We are not versed in the legal means of getting action in Indiana. We do know how virtually every government official has told us that this is not his responsibility and bumped us over to the next official.

Please understand that we are not in a position to hire an attorney. Many of our members are elderly and disabled, and they have invested every last penny they have into this predatory publisher who has now closed down. An attorney would cost us a lot of money, and most of us are tapped out from investing our money in Airleaf. With a company that has closed, it's hard to find an attorney who wants to take the case because there will be limited assets to retrieve. We understand that the owner, Mr. Carl Lau, is claiming bankruptcy.

At this point, we know that there are limited funds that may be returned. Regardless, we would like to see criminal charges pressed against Carl Lau and other employees who knowingly defrauded our authors. We need to send a message that is loud and clear that robbing people of their hopes, dreams, and money is not an allowable practice in Indiana where so many print-on-demand companies are now set up or setting up.

It was not my intention to clog your email system, but rather to make a mass plea to you to help us. We are feeling very lost in this matter. It seems to me that if one person was robbed in your state, action would be taken. We have over 400 people at this point who are part of our group who have been robbed, and yet all we hear is that it's no one's real responsibility and we should get an attorney.

Maybe you can still help us by contacting the FBI and Postal Authorities to make sure that this case is being investigated and that the criminal (s) will not be allowed to go unpunished. I will not have people write to you anymore. If I need information, I will come to you directly and relay your messages. If there is any information that I can provide for you that will help this case move along, please let me know.

Thank you for listening, and I appreciate whatever you can do for us.

Sincerely,

Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.

www.AirleafVictims.com

As a P.S., I received confirmation from 23 more of you who sent out the note to Mr. Morrison during the week, so nearly 150 of us have written to that office. There is no need to send out an email at this point if you haven't done so. Mr. Morrison certainly knows about the Airleaf Victims. One thing that this experience is teaching me at this stage of my life is how wrong my perceptions of government were. Morrison stated: "I am sure the Governor, the Indiana Attorney General, and the offices of Senators Bayh and Lugar are also “distraught.” None of these entities have any criminal jurisdiction in Indiana." This was amazing to me. I never realized that these political offices have no criminal jurisdiction. Did you?

On a personal note, I do know that things are moving, even if the wheels are spinning slowly for our satisfaction. Many of you are left in limbo at the moment because you are anxious to receive your files and books. I am hoping that Captain Buskirk will have some news for us this week.

Some of us received forms this week from the Attorney General's office once again called Consumer Complaint Forms. I called Tom Irons from the AG's office who is the most responsive of all government officials I have dealt with. He is checking to see why this second form was sent to us since we filled out the original form online and then received a hard copy form to fill out after that. He will get back to me this week, so you can wait until you hear from me before you fill this one out. Please be assured that since Tom took over our case a few weeks ago that he is working on getting our case together. Hopefully, he will be able to pursue a civil case on our behalf.

One of our authors wrote to me about a publishing company, Capstone Fiction, for Christian FICTION. This is in NO WAY to be confused with Capstone Productions, the Hollywood movie company that Carl Lau claimed he was working with. A number of our victims fit into this category. I checked out the company through the Internet and our wonderful resource Victoria Strauss to see if this would be a viable avenue for some of our authors. When I felt comfortable with the results, I wrote to one of the owners, Ramona Tucker, about our situation and asked if our Christian fiction authors could apply to be published with them. Here are some excerpts from Ramona's response:

Hi Bonnie,

I am SO saddened to hear about the experience of your group members with AIrleaf! I hate hearing such stories (and unfortunately, in 25 years of publishing, I’ve heard quite a few of them.) I had never heard of Airleaf, but was able to read through your website information about it just now), but it sounds to me like it was a “self-publisher” (in other words, each of your writers PAID that company to publish their book. There wasn’t really any personal investment from the publisher that they loved/believed in that book. Such things happening—and authors getting taken for a ride because they are so desperate to be published that they’re willing to pay anything—are one of the many reasons we launched Capstone! To give new authors an opportunity to publish and to slowly start growing their reader base…since every good thing takes its time! Capstone is not about “competing” to get the top book/top author; it’s about our passion to get wonderful books that we believe could make it nationally--books with fresh plots, quirky characters into the hands of readers of a broad spectrum of readers. And without the “fear” that if they don’t sell enough the first year that the book will get “axed” by the publisher, as is happening more and more frequently these days.)

Capstone is a one-year-old company (we celebrated our first anniversary on Dec. 31, 2007) but founded by myself and Jeff Nesbit, both veterans of the publishing industry. You can find out a lot about us by googling our names, Capstone Fiction, and going to our website at www.Capstonefiction.com.

Who is Capstone? We are a traditional publisher (in other words, just like Tyndale, Zondervan, Nelson, etc.); when we sign an author’s work, that means we believe in the work and feel strongly that it needs to have a chance in the marketplace (whether it sells 500 copies, 5,000 copies, or 50,000 copies over its lifetime!). Our primary mission is to create opportunities for new, talented Christian writers, while also promoting leading-edge fiction by established Christian authors. Today’s market is very tough for new writers. Most publishing houses, due to tightening the belts with the economy, sign/promote 2-3 top authors, but there’s little room for anyone new (that doesn’t already have a huge platform) to make an inroad. A walk through any Christian bookstore will show you that many of the titles are by the same authors. Also, Christian/inspirational publishers publish very little in the realms of sci-fi, fantasy, juvenile/children’s literature. And it is rare for a publisher to produce a 4-color children’s book since Berryman Graphics (the one huge color press) shut their doors a couple years ago (yet Capstone has produced 2 color titles in the first year of our publication. In a process that normally takes 3 years (6-9 months to read/acquire a manuscript, 3 months for a contract, 6-9 months in editorial/design, and 6-9 months in production, Capstone had already produced 47 titles (going through the same process of acquiring, contracting, editing, designing, etc., that all traditional publishers use) by the end of our first year, on Dec. 31, 2007!

Our titles represent numerous genres of inspirational fiction: historical, fantasy, sci-fi, romance, literary, mystery, biblical, detective, humor, legal/political thrillers, biblical, and suspense. And in a day when, in light of economic realities, publishers have chosen to publish very few children’s and young adult titles, we have published 10 titles spanning those categories.

So, Bonnie, that’s a little bit about us. (And probably more than you wanted!) Take a look at our site, too. We’re straightforward kind of folks. We believe in honesty, integrity, have a passion for broadening the scope of inspirational publishing and giving new authors of brilliantly crafted novels (fiction, only—for all ages). We would welcome submission from any writers, once you and they have checked us out. (And no, we are not an “e” publisher, to combat that notion: when you order a Capstone title from amazon.com for example, you get it in exactly the same timeframe you’d get any other book you order, and in hard copy!) We also work with one of the most creative and brilliant head designers in the publishing business, who has over 22 years in the field, as well (and you can see the result in the wonderful Capstone titles pictured on our site). You’ll find submission guidelines, etc., online, as well. The only thing that has really changed in the interim (which we haven’t been able to update in the flurry), is that it takes us about 4-6 weeks to respond to queries, since we were recently deluged with 800 manuscripts. Word is getting around, and it’s very exciting to see the wonderful manuscripts coming our way!

Thanks for writing, Bonnie! I hope this information is helpful to you and the rest of your group.

If you have a Christian fiction book and would like to submit your query, you can visit their site at www.CapstoneFiction.com. It is a very informative and easy to use site.

To date, I have received 163 surveys back from you. Thank you so much for taking the time to fill these out. I will be compiling the data during the first week of March and getting back to you with the results. If you haven't sent yours in, there is still time. You can do it by email or snail mail. If you need help, just let me know.

The most important thing to remember is that we have to remain vigilant and not get discouraged by the lack of visible progress. Carl Lau is counting on time being on his side and our frustration making us give up. Remember—good things come to those who wait, and they will certainly come to us.

With love and hope,

Bonnie

Airleaf Victims Update February 16, 2008

2008-02-16T21:38:00.001-05:00

FEBRUARY 16, 2008 UPDATE

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

I would like to welcome our new members. As of today, we have 405 members of our Airleaf Victims group.

I would like to thank those of you who took the time to complete the survey from last week and sent me either via email or regular mail the information. This information is vital to our case to help in proving the fraudulence in Airleaf. I believe that when we have all of the information compiled together, we will be able to show that this was the greatest case of predatory publishing in the history of the country. To date, 63 of you have completed the information and sent it to me. If you need assistance in filling out the form, or if you would like me to send you the form as an email if you aren't able to print it out or download the form, please let me know.

We have been conducting our campaign since August 2007. Although it has been six months, and we feel the frustration of not having concrete results from the government authorities, I believe that this case will have some results by the spring. It is essential for us as a group not to get discouraged but to remain vigilant until we accomplish our goals of restitution and retribution. The work we are doing is not only for ourselves, but also for thousands of other authors who will also fall victim to dishonest publishing companies which have no problem stealing the dreams and money away from trusting and unsuspecting people. I believe that this will become a landmark case in the world of publishing and send a message loud and clear to others who are making their dishonest living off the hard work of good and honest authors.

This week, I am asking you to assist me in putting pressure on the U.S. Attorney's office in Indiana. This is the federal agency that has the power to move this case along. This is NOT the Attorney General's office that most of you have contacted for the civil suit, but rather the office in charge of bringing federal charges against Airleaf in conjunction with the FBI and Postal Authorities. I am feeling a sense of frustration because I have left four messages in two week with that agency and have not received a call back since my initial conversation with them last month. The email address is: usains.webmaster@usdoj.gov . You can cut and paste that address into an email or just click into the link. The Indiana U.S. Attorney's name is Timothy M. Morrison. Please tell Mr. Morrison that you are a member of the Airleaf Victim's group and that you have been defrauded out of money and services by this company. You can mention anything you like about your personal experience, and ask him when you can expect his office to take the necessary action to bring justice to our case. There is power in numbers, and if Mr. Morrison receives several hundred emails on Tuesday morning when he returns to work, I am hoping he'll realize how serious this case is. Please send me a note after you do this so I can track how many of you sent this note. It's not a form—just a note, so it should only take a few minutes.

One of our group members spoke with a former Airleaf employee last week who was closely involved in Airleaf until the near end and now has set up in his own publishing business. He told our member that Carl Lau is moving ahead with his new company Novels to Films. I assured this member that the only film that Carl Lau will be working on is "Escape from Alcatraz, Part 2," an autobiographical movie.

Carl Lau's dream of becoming a movie mogul has as much chance as your book becoming a major motion film hit. Ex-employees have told me that he paid money to both Cinemagic (the company that came from Japan and magically went back to Japan with your money but no movies) and LiteStone Entertainment (Al Smith and Lawrence Dixon, which has zero movies to their credit except the trailer for Jessie's Girl) in hopes of being part of the film industry. We all know the story of that fraudulence that I exposed last November. And yet, our member Debbie Stiles received this email from Carl Lau on December 17, 2007, two days before Airleaf shut down:

Hi Ms. Stiles

I’m sure that you have heard many things, however if you read between the lines you can see that Brien Jones and Bonnie Kaye are out to put me out of business and or destroy me personally which is something that they have done very well. It took me 55 years to establish my person and 10 months to destroy everything I worked for.

However the movie deal is real and I am meeting with the money people right after the first of the year in Hollywood. I will know more of the time frames and details at that time.

I will refund the monies as I can, right now money is very tight and I’m trying to get as many books done as I can, so we can more on to 2008 and I label the yeart the movie year. I will make it up to you somehow for being patient.

Thanks so much for your business

Carl

I left this letter un-edited so you can once again see the literary literacy skills of Carl Lau. Once his ghostwriting staff was gone, and he was on his own to correspond with customers, we had the opportunity to see the lack of literacy skills of the man at the top of the company ladder. Unreal! Prior to working for Author House in their sales department before getting fired, Carl Lau was a car salesman for 15 years--and it shows.

While on the subject of Carl and Hollywood, this was on a post of Writer's Weekly back in May 2007:

Sent: Wednesday, May 09, 2007 9:37 AM
To: [TF]
Subject: RE: Compalaint About Airleaf

Dear [TF]

We have told you in the past that your books are at the printers and when I called them yesterday and told them to hurry on your books, they sent me a report that shows that you are 8th on the list. I asked them to please make your book a priority and get it out this week.

I´m sorry that you had to wait however I want t make it up to you; because we are having such great success in Hollywood I will more than happy to take it there for free and present it at the pitchfest in July.

I have been very busy and I thought that others were handling your problem which I see wasn´t the case and just copying me on the emails.

Thanks
Carl Lau
President, Airleaf LLC

The highlighted red is mine; the mistakes are Carl's. Of course, he was having such great success in Hollywood even back then and of course, very busy. Priceless!

I would like to spend a few moments discussing book promotions and the reality of investing money in this. The majority of our victims paid large sums of money for a variety of different promotions including book reviews, advertisements in newspapers, press releases, vanity radio programs, website positions, letters sent to book stores. I cringe every time I look at the money that was spent for these campaigns.

The point I'd like to make is that even if all of these campaigns were actually fulfilled, please keep in mind the money you are spending vs. the money that will be returned to you. After all of the upfront costs that most of us don't realize which include the printing and the standard 55% discount on book sites such as Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.com, you are realistically looking at $2.50 – $3.50 per book. In many cases, you are receiving less than that. If you invest $1,000.00 for promotion, you will have to sell at least 300 – 500 books to recoup that investment. A number of you invested thousands of dollars, meaning you would have to sell thousands of books to recoup your loss not including the price of upfront publishing.

This is why it is so important to be realistic about what your goals are and how they can be accomplished. It is virtually impossible to have a hit seller when your book is Print-On-Demand or a book published by a vanity publisher. I know that we all see advertisements for "Chicken Soup for the Soul" and how that book started out as self-published and became a huge financial success. But how many other self-published books can boast about the same experience? Ummm…I don't know of any others. And even if there are, it's such a slim and remote possibility. Miracles do happen, but very rarely in the POD publishing business.

I am sending you some links on how to do your own marketing and publicity from several websites where I have found some good, solid tips that you can do yourself with little or no expense. Don't feel compelled to buy any books or services from these sites since there are lots of free tips.

LINKS FOR MARKETING:

BOOK MARKETING / BOOK PUBLICITY / BOOK SALES

Free Book Marketing Ideas by Christine Hohlbaum: The Sideroad

Another inexpensive way of marketing your book is through sponsored ads on Goggle through Google Adwords. I use this form of advertising for Airleaf Victims as well as my own personal books. It has been relatively successful for me with a minimal investment. If you would like more information about this or need help in getting started, feel free to write to me, and I'll call you to walk you through the process.

LINK FOR GOOGLE ADWORDS:

Welcome to AdWords

I found a site that lists book publicists. I can't recommend any of them since I have no knowledge of any of them. But you may want to contact a few to see what they can do for you. So let's learn our lesson from Airleaf, so we don't repeat our past mistakes. If you contact a book publicist, make sure to ask the important questions. This would include asking what books they have marketed successfully, asking what their methods are for marketing books, (if it's just sending out press releases to a database, you can do that yourself with the same results for much less money), what are the press contacts that they have, and absolutely ask for references that you can call of authors who have been successful. Ask to see articles where these books have appeared and a list of radio and television shows where their authors have appeared. Think of a list of questions before you call, and if you need any help or want to run it by me first, please do. PLEASE DON'T SIGN INTO ANY AGREEMENT UNTIL YOU CHECK IT OUT. I'm happy to review any agreement before you sign so I can look for holes or other questions you need to ask.

LINK FOR PUBLICISTS:

Book Publicity Services

Please check out our Airleaf Victims blog to see some of our authors' book now displayed. If you have a book that is being sold on Amazon, I will be happy to list your book upon request.

LINK FOR THE AIRLEAF VICTIMS BLOG:

Airleaf Victims

That's the news for this week. Please feel free to send me any comments or questions at Bonkaye@aol.com.

With love and hope,

Bonnie :)

2008-02-09T17:13:00.002-05:00

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE FEBRUARY 9, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

First, welcome to our new members. We have passed the 400-member mark this week with 401 members in our group.

This week, I have no new news to report concerning our case. I anticipate that some action will be taken by later this month. I have calls in to the US Attorney in Indiana, and I hope to hear from him by next week for an update.

This week, I am asking you to help me get our case organized because I believe that we will see some results in the near future from all of our efforts. I have attached a profile sheet for each of you to fill out so I can compile the data for all of us, the government agencies who will be bringing charges against Carl Lau, and the media. All information will be kept confidential from the public unless I personally ask you individually to allow me to share it with an agency or news source. I would never compromise anyone's integrity by giving out information without your permission.

I am trying to pinpoint when the fraudulence started to escalate at Airleaf and who the employees were who knowingly participated in it. I am also trying to differentiate between the publishing services versus the promotional services. Some of you paid for books to be published by Airleaf, some of you paid for your own books to be promoted by Airleaf, and some people paid for publishing and promotion by Airleaf. From our 400 members, I want to get a significant sampling to make comparisons.

For example, I went to Airleaf to publish my book Straight Wives: Shattered Lives. I paid $1,895.00 for publishing, 50 copies, and placement in 15 book stores. That price also included a return policy so I could have books signings. My book was published quickly, and I did receive the 50 copies. However, my book copies did not show up to my first book signing (problems with the printer was the excuse), it never appeared in 15 bookstores (I checked), and when I requested a book signing to be set up in Southern California last summer, I was told that there were no bookstores interested in this in Southern California. Since my book was publicized on national news stories, I found this amazing. I also was promised quarterly royalties, but we all are familiar with that story.

In my early days with Airleaf while I was still in the "honeymoon phase," I bought a promotional package for a book I published through iUniverse called ManReaders: A Woman's Guide to Dysfunctional Men. I paid $350.00 to have the press release for the book sent to "important decision makers" in the television market. Of course, there were no responses, but as my Airleaf consultant told me, "Lots of interest." So in my case, I paid for publishing and promotion of an Airleaf book, and promotion of my own book published elsewhere. On the survey form, please check all of the services that you paid for.

Some of you may need reminders to jog your memories, so I have gone back to some of my old emails and looked at some of the promotions that were sent to me. These include:

You have until November 30, 2006 to save on selected bookselling
services!

Reach 2000 bookstore owners for just $239.40! You save $160!

Reach 1000 Filmmakers for just 210! You save $140!

Reach 400 Traditional Publishers for just $270! You save $180!

Sell your book on 10 websites for $299.40! You save $200!

Reach 10,000 bookstore owners with our Maximum Impact Service which
includes direct telephone calls to bookstores for just $990. You save
$660!

SAVE $900 ON DIRECT CALLING TO BOOKSTORES!

While our email, fax and direct mail campaigns have all been successful,
nothing sells books better than a telephone call to the owner of the
bookstore. We want all of our authors' books to sell, so we are making
our Direct Telephone Calling Service affordable for everyone.
Usually, Direct Telephone Calling is only available as part of our
Maximum Impact Bookselling Package which sells for $1650. However, for
the month of June, we are offering our Direct Telephone Calling as a
stand-alone service for just $750! This is our most effective service
at our lowest price ever.

NEW BOOK OF THE MONTH CLUB

While we have sold thousands of books to hundreds of book stores, we have
never focused on selling books directly to individual readers--Until now!
With Airleaf's new Book of the Month Club we will be tapping into this
multi-billion dollar consumer market for the first time.
Book clubs like Oprah Winfrey's and The Today Show's generate millions of
dollars in book sales every month. We hope our book club will do the same.
We have selected a few of our best titles for club members, but we believe
the Book of the Month Club will benefit ALL Airleaf authors.
Please take a look!

SAVE $900 ON DIRECT CALLING TO BOOKSTORES!

While our email, fax and direct mail campaigns have all been successful,
nothing sells books better than a telephone call to the owner of the
bookstore. We want all of our authors' books to sell, so we are making
our Direct Telephone Calling Service affordable for everyone.

Usually, Direct Telephone Calling is only available as part of our
Maximum Impact Bookselling Package which sells for $1650. However, for
the month of June, we are offering our Direct Telephone Calling as a
stand-alone service for just $750! This is our most effective service
at our lowest price ever.

And my personal favorite lure to author fame from 3/28/07

Is your book the next to appear on the big screen?

Check out www.airleaf.com to see the trailer for our first film, Jessie’s Girl.

We are making another trip to Hollywood in April to present all new books to all new Producers and Directors! We will present your book in face to face meetings for just $650.

So, hopefully some of these campaigns will help you remember which ones you bought. And for sure—they all sounded so, so good—and legitimate!

I would like to share two links with you today. One is from our friend Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware, a website that gives excellent advice to writers and warms them about possible scams. I told Victoria that I am working on some helpful links to help our writers with their book promotions in a meaningful way. I believe that most POD companies that offer package deals are misleading and/or ineffective. All of us want our books to sell, but there are many things that we can do on our own for little or no money rather than pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to promoters.

Victoria welcomed me to share her link about services for writers, and I know you'll find some excellent ideas there.

Link to Writer Beware: Writers' Services

The second link I would like to share with you is the link to help find a literary agent. I have found this link to be extremely helpful when trying to find an agent. It was sent to me by an agent friend, and I have been using it to test it out. There is no cost for using this link, Agent Query. Some of you have written to me that you would like to go through a "traditional" publishing route, so here is the way to start.

Link to Agent Query:

AgentQuery :: Find the Agent Who Will Find You a Publisher

Some words of advice when seeking a literary agent: Expect rejection and don't personalize it. I have gone through the traditional route twice. I have found two excellent agents, one who was able to sell my first book, and a second one who believed in my book but was unable to sell it. I sent out 60 targeted inquiry letters both times and only received three people who were interested the first time and two people interested the second time. And although I was able to sell my first book, there was a long turn-around time between throughout this journey. So if you are expecting a quick fix—forget it. Make sure that if you choose this route that you have a strong query letter done in the proper format. There are lots of websites that give great advice in how to prepare one, and I am always happy to look it over for you and give suggestions. Also keep in mind if you are lucky enough to find an agent, there is usually a back up time in publishing once they find a publisher of between 12 and 18 months.

Last week, I sent you to our Airleaf Victims blog site. If you looked there, you saw my books were listed on the right hand side and available on Amazon. If you are selling your books on Amazon, my blog-keeper will be glad to have your book or books listed on our Airleaf Victims site. Just drop me a note, and I'll tell you what I need.

Here is a link to the Airleaf Victims blog site so you can see my books listed:

Airleaf Victims

In the upcoming weeks, I will share some excellent ideas and links with you to help you with your book promotion. These links and ideas are mostly free ideas that you can do yourself.

Please remember to fill out your survey and get it back to me with any documentation you have. If you want to send it to me by mail, my home address is listed on the bottom of the form. In three weeks, I will take a few days off from my job so I can compile all of the information that you are sending in and give you the results. If you do not have a printer and you would like me to send you the form as an email, just let me know.

With love and hope,

Bonnie Kaye :)

AIRLEAF VICTIMS UPDATE FEBRUARY 2, 2008

2008-02-02T18:49:00.000-05:00

February 2, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

As of today, we have 391 members in our Airleaf Victims group. Each week, more people are finding us as they try to call Airleaf or check their website only to find they have vanished.

Earlier in the week, I spoke to Detective Buskirk. He is moving along with the case, and as of the time of our conversation, he had 256 official complaints from our group. He is preparing his case to present to the federal agencies which can bring criminal charges against the people from Airleaf who have victimized us. I am hoping that we will see some concrete results this month. He is also trying to arrange times when authors who want to pick up their files and books can do so and hopes that will happen shortly. Hang in, and I’ll keep you posted.

Yesterday, I spoke with Tom Irons from the Attorney General’s office. Tom is a very nice man who took over the case from Terry Tolliver after Tolliver left several months ago. Until that point, the incoming complaint files were just being compiled by paralegal Raven Bobbio, but it appears nothing more than that happened in the interim. After having my second in-depth conversation with Tom, I realized that regardless of how strong of a case we currently have (he told me new complaints are still coming in each week from our group), there is nothing very meaningful that his office can do at this time. In as much as the AG’s office can only bring civil charges, and in view of the fact that Airleaf is now shut down thanks to our efforts, his office is somewhat at a loss of taking meaningful action. He went through all of the steps that their office would have to go through to get to get to court with Carl Lau, and it sounds very overwhelming as far as getting us real results.

And so we will have to put our faith in the federal agencies such as the FBI, Postal Inspector, and US Attorney in Indiana for getting meaningful resolve. I did explain to him that I hold the AG’s office responsible for allowing things to get to this point since they were aware of our situation and sat on it for so long. The AG’s office was aware of Airleaf last year when they made settlement with two other authors, issued them a warning as I’ve mentioned in an earlier update, and sat on it when our complaints started coming in to them. Since the AG’s office is responsible for consumer fraud, I contend that it was their responsibility to protect us. If they could have put an injunction against Airleaf until our issues were resolved, many of our victims who were taken after August when our complaints started flowing in could have been saved. In the days ahead, I will be asking for accountability of that agency with other government officials who oversee that office.

I’m sure if Tom were there during our tribulations, he would have been very responsive, but he started in this job too late. However, he is going to pursue whatever action he can for us, and he is working to organize a case from the complaints that have been filed to see if he can put together a civil complaint for restitution for us. I will check back with him next month to see how he is progressing.

I recently asked the group if you have documentation about the “Hollywood Pitches” that Airleaf charge you for to take your books to Hollywood. Seven of you saved the information that was sent to you with the report and mailed me copies to compare. It was no surprise that they were the standard printed letters that I expected to find. I’d like to share this with you.

First—here was the confirmation to authors:

Dear _______________

This agreement is for the “Face to Face Hollywood” program, where your book will be discussed in meetings set with Hollywood producers.

Per our agreement we will create a “Film Treatment” of your book and have at least 5 face to face meetings with different producers, promoting it for feature film, direct to video, or TV.

Also per our agreement you will receive updates after the interviews with the producer’s company name, and dates of the presentations.

Thank you for your business,

Carl Lau, President, Airleaf Publishing

Well, it didn’t look like the “5 face to face meetings” ever happened, but here are the results of the “Face to Face Hollywood” program sent out to the authors.

All of the form letters were dated either June 7 or June 8, 2007.

Dear _________

The producers that I met with this time in the representation of your books are as follows:

Al Smith – Lite-stone Entertainment

Brad Hong – Cinemagic Entertainment

Cliff Miracle – Capstone Productions

I met with these people privately so I had plenty of time to thoroughly discuss, the overview of your film idea. I have received commitments for 6 different children’s books for “direct to video” production, as a direct result from those meetings. This is very exciting, and as of yet I have not been told of any rejections, which is also good news!

If you look on our website, you will see over 20 books that we have movie commitments for. When I present to other producers and tell them that we have “X” amount of said commitments, they take us seriously and pay attention to what we have.

I have already seen this and use it to our advantage. For the last 2 years we have worked very hard to get a movie made. We knew that once we did, each one after that would be easier to get done.

We do see that happening and hopefully yours too will soon find itself in that mix. These producers and filmmakers know of your books. If we hear anything, you’ll be the second to know.

Thanks for giving us the opportunity to pitch your film idea. I will be going back for follow up in a little over a month. Feel free to let me know if you need anything.

Best regards,

Carl Lau, President, Airleaf LLC

(I have reprinted the letters exactly—not cleaning up the poor grammar skills of Carl Lau)

Now, if I were one of the victims who paid for this service, I would have felt very excited—as you all did. There was no way for you to know that this was a fraudulent set-up. This is where Lite Stone Entertainment falls into my conspiracy theory because they put up their website listing 20 Airleaf books in production or pre-production. Those were the 20 of you who believed you really had a chance after getting your books made into a movie. This gave more false hope for those of you who started investing in the Hollywood promotions. You were seeing actual Airleaf authors whose books were in production or pre-production—and you believed with the excellent marketing of Airleaf’s sales team that yours could be the next big hit. You were told that Jessie’s Girl was an Airleaf book being made into a major film—and the trailer for the film was at the top of the Airleaf website to make you believe that this could happen to you. You were duped by the best.

We all know the Lite Stone story. And the Cinemagic Story is well…magic—here today, gone tomorrow. Carl Lau hooked up with Brad Hung from Japan’s Cinemagic at one of these gatherings. The “magic” about Brad Hung is that he disappeared, never to be seen again except on the Airleaf website sitting with a few of our authors. That was the most visible he was in this country.

Then there was Cliff Miracle of Capstone Productions. I’ve tried researching this with no luck at all. I did find a Capstone Productions on the Internet and explained our situation. Their representative was kind enough to write back:

Bonnie,

Good morning. There are a number of Capstone production companies out there, but we’ve never been involved with any movie making. We specialize in TV and radio commercials and corporate videos. Feel free to call or write if you have any further questions.
Jeff Hayes
COO, Capstone Production Group

So if any of you have a clue how to find Cliff Miracle at Capstone, please let me know because I’d like to have a chat with him--if he really does exist. And that would truly be a “miracle.”

Each week, I send a copy of this update to various government officials. It has been brought to my attention that others also check this weekly update in our blog. It is important for us to keep telling the stories to pressure the authorities to take action. When you have a chance, please check out our blog. Here is the link:

BLOG LINK: Airleaf Victims

At the bottom of the blog there is a place for you to post comments. These comments are read by the people following our case—government officials, former Airleaf employees, and of course, Carl Lau. It’s important to start voicing your feelings when you have a chance. If you are willing to share your stories in this update, this is important as well to let others know they are not alone in being taken by Airleaf.

Next week, I’ll be sending you a questionnaire to fill out so I can systematically put all of this together to help the legal authorities in an organized manner. It is important for us to keep up the momentum as we move along. We don’t want the Airleaf fraudulence to be an issue that is overlooked or underrated as far as a priority. We must keep up our pressure on the federal agencies so that we can seek justice for the hundreds, if not thousands, of victims that are out there. And when this does get to trial, I look forward to meeting some of you as we celebrate our success.

Please feel free to write to me with any questions or concerns.

With love and hope,

Bonnie :)

Examples of Fraud

2008-01-26T00:29:00.000-05:00

January 26, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

I would like to welcome the new members of Airleaf Victims. Our group now numbers 384 as of today.

This week, I did not speak to any of the government agencies. I’ll be following up next week with our contacts to date.

I did have some wonderful news from one of our authors. He received back a payment of $1,600.00 to his credit card. I asked him to share with us how this happened to inspire others to keep trying:

I wrote a check to Airleaf in October 2006. It was to pay for theproduction of two books at $800 apiece. Due to the experience ofhaving several books published previously, I knew it would not takeonly five or six weeks to produce them--twelve to fourteen months isthe norm in the industry--from beginning to end.When I wrote my check, I thought it was for the production AND theprinting of the books. However, in May 2007 Airleaf said I was wrongin this assumption, that I had only been paying for the production ofthe books. They then said they wanted to use my credit card to payfor the printing of the first book ($800).Thirty days later (June) they wanted to use my credit card again forprinting the second book (another $800). I thought it highlyirregular, but I gave them permission both times.I learned of their troubles in early September through some ex-Airleafemployees whose checks had recently bounced.I immediately sent a report to the fraud department at MasterCard,along with the evidence of their brochure to give them a better ideaof what sort of business Airleaf was. MasterCard wrote me a letterand said that they would investigate the situation.On December 27, I received a letter from MasterCard that told me thatmy claim was not valid, that the transaction took place long past the60-day agreement of my MasterCard contract. I complained to the frauddepartment, which routed me to the dispute department. They gave mean address to take my complaint to; they also said that my case wouldbe greatly helped if I had some evidence to prove my case.It was then that I learned that the documentary evidence that I hadsent them in September was not in my file. I guess the personhandling my case had either thrown it out or had misfiled it--orsomething.So with some help from Bonnie Kaye, I obtained some Airleafpromotional materials to send them once again. I sent it along with aletter that made the case that the product that Airleaf sold was aservice that took several months to produce; it was not something thatyou could find purchase satisfaction or non-satisfaction within the60-days mentioned in my contract with them. I explained thatproducing a book takes months not days--and having visited Airleaf'soffices on three occasions (before and after the initial transaction),I knew that they did not have the manpower to produce very many booksat a time.I ended my argument by stating that Airleaf never did any work on mybook. They instead used $1600 of my money to pay off their creditors.They had taken my money but produced no work--and had no intention ofdoing so. Therefore, the two $800 transactions were invalid.I sent my complaint on January 14, and on January 24 MasterCard calledme and said that they were going to reimburse me for the $1600. Theysaid that the original person handling my case had misunderstood thenature of the transaction. I was satisfied with that, and they werevery nice about it.For me, half the battle has been won. Now I hope to get the rest ofthe money back (the other $1600). An Airleaf Author
I was very excited to hear this news, and I am hearing it more often for people who are willing to fight. I have been sending out letters on behalf of our authors telling credit card companies about our plight, and that seems to help. If any of you would like my assistance, please let me know, and I’m happy to provide you with a letter.

There was some other good news from another one of our authors. A number of you were upset when iUniverse wouldn’t publish your book at the reduced “in print” price of $299.00 unless you had a letter from Airleaf stating they are releasing your book. One author wrote to me and said:

Bonnie, I've received two letters: one is from Carl Lau, granting a release to me and my book from any contractual obligation that was between Airleaf LLC and me. The other letter is from the office of the Indiana Attorney General, saying that a copy of my complaint was sent to Airleaf, and that an investigation of my complaint would be done. Hope it works!

I went on to ask the author how he was able to obtain the letter. He stated:

I sent a Letter to Mr. Lau's Greenwood address at 846 Burwick Trce, IN 46143-1910 and he responded 5 days later.

That is very exciting news for sure. If any of you would like to get a letter releasing your book, please write to Carl Lau and ask him to send you that letter. His home address is listed above.
One of our authors shared a letter she received from the Better Business Bureau last week from Carl Lau. It was sent to Diane Dove at the BBB and stated:

Airleaf LLC, is insolvent and will be closing effective at the end of the business today, December 21st 2007. We have been in the “wind down mode” since May, 2007, and have learned that a potential investor has decided against investing in Airleaf.
We have been talking to a bankruptcy attorney about filing both business and personal bankruptcy.

Carl Lau, Airleaf LLC
I did find this part interesting: “We have been in the ‘wind down mode’ since May, 2007…” I’m not sure what this means. What wound down? Surely not the attempts to take people’s money from May until December. There were numerous advertisements after those dates that most of us have received. Just to review a few for you to jog your memory:

June 2007

Walk the Red Carpet with Airleaf on the Carnival Sensation

For a limited time only, Airleaf has made arrangements to secure an audience with film producer Al Smith of LiteStone Entertainment. This weekend will guarantee a one-on-one meeting with you and LiteStone Entertainment offering you the opportunity to see what the film industry is looking for and if your book has what it takes to make the red carpet.
September 27-30, hear world-class speakers and attend valuable workshops promoting book sales. Schedule your time with Airleaf Executives, including Carl Lau, to discuss national exposure and enjoy benefiting from other authors’ experiences while cruising to Nassau, Bahamas.

There are only 13 cabins available as of today and due to limited availability on board the ship, they must be reserved by Friday, June 29, 2007. Get your passports ready and call Dawn directly at 1-800-342-6068 or email dduncan@airleaf.com. Welcome aboard!
Of course, we all learned about the Carnival “Sensation” that was never booked even though authors paid for the cruise and never received their money back.

Here’s another classic from the “wind down time” period:

July 30, 2007

Dear Author,
For over two years Airleaf Publishing & Book Selling has been impacting the Hollywood movie scene by connecting authors directly to decision makers in film and television. We will be walking the red carpet at the Kodak Theatre made popular by American Idol located in Hollywood, California in November 2007 with our feature film currently in production, Jessie’s Girl. We recently discovered your book and we believe it has the potential to be a feature film. Here are some exciting opportunities we have available for your true Hollywood experience!
Industry Executive $599
Introduce your book to Filmmakers and Producers in Hollywood Why spend time worrying about travel expenses to Hollywood and trying to find the connections you need to get your book in front of film and television executives? Let the Airleaf professionals do it for you! We currently have several books optioned for film and we’re prepared to get your book in the hands of movie making companies. We will prepare a full color filmmaker’s treatment and present it to industry executives and give you a status report when we return.

Producer $995
Present your book to Direct to DVD video producers. Present your book to the Movie industry via Direct to DVD companies. Many films are released directly to the shelves of video rental stores and movie selling specialty stores. Airleaf can get your book in front of the people who can make that happen. AND we’ll include the Industry Executive benefits with the purchase of this package!
Director $1295

Have a Hollywood Director review your book A producer/director will review your book and send you a comprehensive review. Have you ever wondered if your book would make a good movie? These are the industry professionals that can lead you into the world of film and television. AND we’ll include the Industry Executive and Producer level benefits with the purchase of this package!

Our goal is to put your book in front of movie goers nationwide. We can make your red carpet dreams come true. We already have many books optioned for film, two are in production and yours could be next! To participate call 1-800-342-6068 or email dduncan@airleaf.com

Sincerely, Dawn Duncan-Rodgers Author Consultant

This promotion truly had a powerful impact. You remember the lie I exposed to you back in the fall about Jessie’s girl, right? There was no movie in production, and here Dawn Duncan-Rodgers was sending us promotions about walking the red carpet at the Kodak Theater in November 2007 for the opening of an unproduced movie. Just in case you think we are going to have a problem proving FRAUD with Airleaf, fear not dear authors. It doesn’t get more fraudulent than that! Well, let me correct that statement—tied for first place in the fraudulence contest is the statement, “For over two years Airleaf Publishing & Book Selling has been impacting the Hollywood movie scene by connecting authors directly to decision makers in film and television.” Hmmm..impacting the Hollywood movie scene. Mind-blowing for sure!

This week I have been investigating many of your advertisements and results of the Hollywood pitch fests. I will try to get you those results shortly. You’ll find them most interesting—and at this point, most predicable.

Although the wheels of justice are turning slowly, they are turning--trust me. It is important for us to keep up the momentum and our hopes without getting discouraged. We have to look at the big picture here and realize that all of our efforts will create a major impact not only on Airleaf, but also for other companies who are setting up with the intentions of taking money from unsuspecting authors.

Have a good week—things are looking up!
With love and hope,
Bonnie Kaye :)

Airleaf Victims & Supporters, Amazon.com, Captain Jeff Buskirk.

2008-01-19T16:19:00.000-05:00

Dear Airleaf Victims and Supporters,

As of today, we have 371 people in our group. Welcome to our new members. Please know that our group is working hard to find restitution and retribution for the fraudulence committed against us by Carl Lau of Airleaf Publishing.

First, we had good news from Captain Jeff Buskirk. For those of you who didn’t get his email, I’m attaching Friday’s correspondence from him:

Hello everyone,

This is an update on the case so you will know what is going on from the law enforcement side. First, I have been given to work on this case as much as needed and so I will be taking care of this case. Second, I have delivered a letter and needs you have sent me to Carl Lau's attorney thru the Prosecutor's Office hoping to get your books, manuscripts, etc, and maybe some refunds back. Don't spend your refunds yet, though, as I don't have that much faith. Anyway, I have also suggested to them a day or two where any of you close enough to come and pick up your items could do so. Again, I am waiting for reply. The case is coming along and I am finally seeing a light at the end of the tunnel on paperwork and getting this organized for presentation to the Prosecuting Attorney.

Please try to communicate with me thru email, but I really have a hard time answering any specific Qs at this time until I get all your records from our forensic computer guy. Airleaf did in fact keep records of each of your sales etc, so eventually we should be able to tell how much they owe each one of you on royalties as well as no services formed.

When you have this many people complaining, it takes a long time to go thru each one and find out where the cases are going, so please be patient.
I will stay in contact with you with updates as something happens.

Capt. Jeffrey C Buskirk % Martinsville Police DeptPO Box 1415 Martinsville, Indiana 46151765-342-6614 Office 765-342-6725 FAX

This is good news for us. We were worried when Captain Buskirk was reassigned back to the street patrol. But now he is able to spend time each day working on our case which is a big plus. That’s why it’s so important to make sure that you send him your information about what you feel is owed to you material and money wise. If you haven’t done so yet, please email him at: jbuskirk@rnetinc.net

I want to thank those of you who have sent complaints to the FBI and Postal Authorities. At this point of time, these reports are our best hope of achieving our goals. This was confirmed by the following:

At the suggestion of my author friend Richard Fracasso, I spoke to the U.S. Attorney’s office in Indiana on Thursday. I had an extensive conversation with the representative who confirmed more of what I learned last week from the new Assistant Attorney General (AG). The U.S. Attorney is in charge of federal criminal crimes as opposed to the AG’s office which in Indiana is only responsible for civil charges. That surprised some of you, but apparently each state works differently with the AG’s role. In Indiana, it is for civil charges with a couple of criminal charges involving Medicare fraud—not publishing fraud.

The U.S. Attorney explained to me that “fraud” has to be proven. I gave him some examples of how we were scammed by Airleaf, and he clarified better for me what is needed. So, my authors, here is where I need your help for starters.

Some of you bought promotional packages for Germany, London, and Hollywood. Some of you received reports back from Airleaf in writing or verbally stating what had happened with your book. I need you to look for those reports so that I can compare them. Some of you have written to me that you have those reports, and I would appreciate your letting me know if this is the case as soon as possible. Please drop me at note at Bonkaye@aol.com if you saved yours. I believe the Hollywood reports stated which producers had been “pitched” your books and what the results were. For the Germany and London trips, if you received either verbal or written reports about your book, that would be fine. Some of you were also told the truth—the trips to Europe never took place, but your money was never returned. If you are in that situation, please let me know.

If you have not filed a report with the postal inspector or FBI, I am giving you the links to do so again. If you don’t have hard copies of any mail because you didn’t save it, you can still fill out the online postal link. If you need a copy of the “cheat sheet” for the postal form that you print out when you have information to send in, just let me know and I’ll email it to you. Also, please send me a note when you complete any of these forms if you haven’t done so yet because I am tracking the numbers.

FBI LINK: Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3)

Link for Postal Inspector if you have copies of any Airleaf promotions mailed to you: http://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/radDocs/ps8165.pdf

Link for Postal Inspector if you don’t have copies of what was mailed to you or if you prefer to fill in an online complaint:

POSTAL ONLINE COMPLAINTS

Next week, I will ask you to fill out for my own use to try to gather any pieces together that I can submit to the U.S. Attorney proving fraud. It will be an easy form asking you basic questions. All of you on this list have contacted me, but I need specific information. I’m not looking to make extra work for you, and it will only take a few moments to fill out. But I want to compile as much as the facts as possible so we can present our case to the proper authorities and make sure that we build our case.

In my effort to get information from Amazon.com, I sent this letter to their corporate headquarters in Washington State.

December 27, 2007
Dear Amazon.com,

I am hoping that you can help our group, Airleaf Victims, with a quandary we are in.
I represent a group of nearly 300 authors who either had books published through Airleaf Publishing or bought promotional services from this company. You can see the information on my website at www.AirleafVictims.com. This company defrauded us out of nearly 1 million dollars. We are taking whatever legal action is possible to see that the owner of the company, Carl Lau, has criminal charges pressed against him.

In the meantime, he shut down the company last week as can be verified by the Martinsville, IN police department. I am trying to find the best solutions for our group as far as republishing their books. But in the meantime, we will depend on whatever stock Amazon has left to sell.
My questions to you on behalf of our group are:

1. Is there any way you can provide us with an accurate accounting of how many books have been sold? We will need this to pursue legal damages.

2. Is there any way for you to make sure that no further payments go to Airleaf since almost all of our authors have never seen the monies due to them, and with the closing of Airleaf, we will never see any future sales.

I appreciate your help and input in this matter.

Sincerely,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.
www.AirleafVictims.com

This week, I received this response:

Greetings from Amazon.com.We are responding to a recent request that we received via postal mail concerning your dispute with AirLeaf Publishing. As Amazon.com is an Internet company, we ask that all communication be done through our online site. For this reason, we are following-up via e-mail.As my colleague, Johnathan, explained in your phone conversation, we aren't able to disclose sales figures. As to stopping payments to the publisher, that would involve contractual obligations that we in Customer Service are not able to address.As you mention there is a criminal investigation, you may want to contact our legal department if specific information is required. As a matter of practice, Amazon.com normally requires valid subpoenas before complying with third-party requests to provide information about sellers or customers.

Amazon.com
Legal Dept.
P.O. Box 81226
Seattle, WA 98108-1226
Fax: 206-266-7010

I hope this information was helpful.
Thank you for your interest in Amazon.com.

This week, I was able to speak to the legal department at Amazon.com. I updated our member information which has grown extensively since that first correspondence, and I explained how we need to find an accurate accounting of our sales because this can be a boost for us. If we can prove that royalties were sent in and used for anything other than royalties, this can be part of the criminal charges. I also explained how authors were not receiving royalties, so we didn’t want Airleaf getting our money. The representative stated that he would meet with the Amazon.com lawyers to see what could be done for us. I will keep you posted as soon as I hear anything.I am continuing to work on publicity for our Airleaf Victims. Hopefully, this week we’ll have some word from FOX News. Also, if there are other Airleaf Victims in Indiana who are willing to talk to the press via television or newspaper, please email me as quickly as possible.

With love and hope,

Bonnie Kaye, Organizer, Airleaf Victims

January 12, 2008

2008-01-12T14:29:00.000-05:00

January 12, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Friends,

First, I’d like to welcome our new group members. We now have 358 members in our Airleaf Victims family which grows daily. There are many sad stories of victims who have suffered from the anguish of broken Airleaf promises and contracts.

Before I give you the news for the week, I am in the process of working on our publicity campaign. I have some interest from NY FOX. I’ve asked you in the past if you would be interested in participating in a story, and I have a few of you who have agreed to do this. If any other people are from the NY, NJ, or CT area and you would be willing to participate, please email me at Bonkaye@aol.com. In the next week, I will let you know if this will proceed. Also, I am looking for people in Indiana who are willing to do publicity about their experiences with Airleaf. If you live in Indiana and you are willing, please let me know.

I have a local CBS affiliate in Philadelphia who is interested in the story, so if you live in the Philadelphia or surround areas and you are willing to participate, please contact me. It’s time for us to move ahead with bringing media attention to our cause.

And speaking of that, if you haven’t sent your request in to Oprah to help our Airleaf victims, please fill this form out. The more letters her producers receive, the more they will think about doing our story.

LINK TO OPRAH OPRAH LINK

On Wednesday, I received a call from Tom Irons, the new Assistant Attorney General in Indiana who has taken over our case. Many of you received letters from Raven Bobbio, paralegal, who was compiling the case. The created a major source of frustration for me on a personal level. Once Terry Tolliver left back in November, Raven was the contact person. I left messages for her several times, but never received a return phone call. Tom said on his message that he is now in charge of the case, and that he would reconnect with me after he had a chance to go through things.

I decided not to wait until that time and called him on Friday. He was very helpful, courteous, and understanding of our frustrations. He wasn’t very familiar with all of the specifics of our case, but he had read our Airleaf Victims website and blog, so he had an indication of the depth of the problem. When I spoke to him, he had just gotten off the phone with Detective Jeff Buskirk who was giving him some of the details of our case.

After speaking to him for nearly an hour, I had a much better understanding of how the government of Indiana plays out in this situation. Tom explained that the AG’s office can only go after someone for civil charges—not criminal charges. They have the power to ask for restitution when there is money that can be restored. At this point of time with Airleaf closed, it’s an involving process discovering assets, and we as a group may need to decide if we want to do something along those lines. If any of you are involved in this kind of legal, financial, or detective work and can lend a hand, please let me know.

I explained our frustration in this matter with AG’s office since they have been very unresponsive to us as a group. I told him that I hold their office responsible for allowing this company to continue in view of the problems that arose last year when an AVC or Assurance of Voluntary Compliance was issued to Airleaf. An AVC, according to the website of Steve Carter, AG of Indiana is:

An agreement reached between the State and one or more respondents stipulating the conditions under which the respondent(s) will conduct business in the future. An AVC may require the defendant(s) to pay consumer restitution and investigative costs to the attorney general’s office. The document is filed with the court but is not an admission of guilt or liability for any legal offense. The State has a legal right to go back to court if information becomes available that the defendant is not abiding by the terms of the AVC.

This happened to Airleaf on May 25, 2007. Two authors appealed to the AG’s office to help them, and they won. I’ve read through the document, and according to the decision, I cut and pasted some of the major points:

The terms of this Assurance apply to and are binding upon the Respondent, its employees, agents, representatives, successors, and assigns.

The Respondent acknowledges the jurisdiction of the Consumer Protection Division of the Office of the Attorney General to investigate matters hereinafter described, pursuant to the authority of the Indiana Code.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, the subject of a consumer transaction has sponsorship, approval, performance, characteristics, accessories, uses, or benefits it does not have, which the Respondent knows or reasonably should know it does not have.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to refrain from representing, either orally or in writing, a consumer will be able to purchase an item as advertised by the Respondent, if the Respondent does not intend to sell it.

The Respondent shall fully cooperate with the Office of the Attorney General in the resolution of any future written complaints the Consumer Protection Division receives. This shall include, but is not limited to, the Respondent promptly resolving any additional valid consumer complaints brought to the Respondent's attention by the Office of the Attorney General, either prior to, or after the filing of, this Assurance with the Court.

The Respondent, in soliciting and/or contracting with consumers, agrees to fully comply with the Deceptive Consumer Sales Act, Ind. Code Upon execution of this Assurance, the Respondent shall pay consumer restitution, in the total amount of Six Thousand Nine Hundred and Ninety-Nine Dollars

($6,999.00), to the Office of the Attorney General for allocation and distribution to the following consumers in the following amounts:

(a) John L. Kostoryz of Kansas City, Missouri $5,500.00; and
(b) John K. Phillips of Baton Rouge, Louisiana $1,499.00.
Total: $6,999.00

Upon execution of this Assurance, the Respondent shall pay costs in the amount of One Thousand Dollars ($1,000.00) to the Office of the Attorney General. The Respondent shall fully cooperate with the Office of the Attorney General in the resolution of any future written complaints the Consumer Protection Division receives. This shall include, but is not limited to, the Respondent promptly resolving any additional valid consumer complaints brought to the Respondent's attention by the Office of the Attorney General, either prior to, or after the filing of, this Assurance with the Court.

I explained to Tom that we felt very angry that this order had been issued last May by THEIR office. They never followed through with it even though over 100 complaints have been processed.

I know that many more of you have sent in complaints to the AG’s office, but this is how their government works.

1. I filed a complaint online in August 2007.

2. I received written verification in September from the AG’s office and was asked to sign the online form. I sent it back immediately.

3. In December 10, 2007, I received a letter from Stephanie Medina in the AG’s office telling me that the letter confirms the receipt of the information I sent back, but says they are unable to process the complaint with the information submitted, and that now, I have to fill out another complaint form if my ICCC complaint has not been resolved. This is another long form with the same information as the original form filed in August. Why didn’t they just tell me this in September?

4. On December 31, 2007, I received a letter from paralegal Raven Bobbio stating that they have received my complaint and forwarded it to Airleaf. The form letter says, “I ask for your patience as our office attempts to mediate your complaint. We must allow a reasonable amount of time for Airleaf to reply.”

There is something really wrong here. In the five months since my initial complaint was filed along with a number of our early victims, many new people were defrauded. In as much as the AG’s office issued the Assurance of Voluntary Compliance in May, they should have immediately responded as soon as one more complaint was filed. I hold this office responsible for their negligence on acting on behalf of our victims who followed all of their rules but still had no help in stopping the criminal actions of Airleaf.

This proves to me more than ever that Carl Lau is truly a sociopath. The man believes he is “above the law.” Even when given directives to stop his unlawful business practices which I have highlighted in red for you, he continued even bigger and better to violate the rules. When his production department completely shut down in November, and there was not a printer in sight that would work with him because he owed out so much money, he continued to have publishing and promotional packages sold to unsuspecting victims. Let’s go back to the first part of the document also stated that:

The terms of this Assurance apply to and are binding upon the Respondent, its employees, agents, representatives, successors, and assigns.

This means that any person who worked for Airleaf who knowingly sold to you when they knew there was no way to deliver the promises is also legally responsible for violating this agreement. I plan to see what civil charges can be brought against those employees who are guilty, and I will keep you posted.

Tom Irons also explained that the federal agencies are the ones that need to bring the criminal charges. These are the FBI and Postal Inspector, so it’s vital that you fill out those forms.

Last week, I sent you the link to the postal forms. Some of you wrote to me and said that you didn’t save the documentation that Airleaf sent you. For those of you who don’t have the documentation, you can fill out an easy online complaint that only takes a few moments. Every complaint strengthens our case. Please drop me a note after you complete this step.

POSTAL ONLINE COMPLAINTS Here’s the link to the postal online form:

On Friday, I received a letter from Senator Lugar’s office. It stated that the Senator works with constituents from his state of Indiana, but they have sent my concerns to the Senator in my state of Pennsylvania, Arlen Specter, and I should be hearing from his office soon. Thanks, Senator Lugar. I appreciate the referral—NOT! I called Senator Specter’s office to give them a heads up, and had a nice conversation with a representative. We both agreed that Pennsylvania has no jurisdiction over the business dealings in Indiana. My office would be happy to send a request to the Indiana AG’s office on my behalf, and I will take that step just to follow protocol, but I know it won’t have any effect whatsoever. So once again, the government of Indiana is ignoring the pleas for help from victims of a company in their state. Is it any accident that so many Print-on-Demand publishing houses are located there?

Here’s an update on iUniverse back-in-print. A number of you contacted them after THEY contacted me soliciting our authors for their back-in-print package for $299.00. It sounded like a reasonable solution for many of our authors who wanted to keep their books in print. Then this week, one of our authors informed me that iUniverse would not do the reprints unless they received a letter from Airleaf stating there is a reversion of rights. They said the company could have sold off the rights to other companies causing legal issues. Get everyone together with a petition for a reversion of rights because they were a suspicious company and they are not sure if the authors still owned their rights. I spoke to Kaitlin at iUniverse on Thursday about the problem. She researched it for me and left me a message suggesting that we get a petition together and ask the Attorney General to provide this information for us. I will call her back on Monday to discuss how we have in our contracts that we retain the rights to our book and see if that changes anything. We all know what will happen if you have to wait for the Attorney General to act on our behalf, so I don’t want to go that route. However, if any of you would like to call Carl Lau and ask him to provide that statement for you, feel free to do so. His information is:
Carl Lau, 846 Burwick Trcem, Greenwood, IN 46143-1910 Phone: (317) 889-6063.
Kaitlin also stated you could pay more money for their new publishing package and publish your book as a “second edition.” I decided to pass that on to you, but I am not suggesting it because there are companies that are more reasonable to work with than iUniverse for regular publishing packages.

I wanted to share some information with you from our fellow author Anthony Laurento. Tony has written a children’s book. He paid Airleaf over $5,000.00 for publishing, illustrations, and promotions. Now he has decided to take control over his own project and get it done on his own. He explained the process he used to find an illustrator. Some of you have written to me that you have the same issue of finding an illustrator for your books. I asked Tony to fill us in on how he found his illustrator.

Hi Bonnie,

The website is http://www.elance.com/

It is free and a very easy step-by-step program after you register and post your project. The whole bidding process took about 10 days and you can alter the time for the bidding as well as stipulate many parameters, including only local Illustrators or no international companies, and you ask for the price that you want to pay. All of the contracts go through Elance, and any changes between you and the illustrator go through Elance. I really enjoyed the process. The illustration company that I chose was called Deskcube, but it was a tough decision after I got down to the final 3. At least I felt in control the entire time, unlike with Airleaf.

I want to thank Tony for sharing this information, and if any of you have other suggestions that can help authors, please feel free to let me know.

With love and hope,
Bonnie Kaye

Airleaf Victims & Supporters

2008-01-06T05:05:00.000-05:00

January 5, 2008

Dear Airleaf Victims and Supporters,

First, let me wish you all a happy New Year filled with health, happiness, and success. As the New Year of 2008 begins, we have gained an impressive new number of Airleaf Victims this week. We are now at 348 victims and growing daily. Welcome to all of our new members. You are part of a wonderful group of people who are seeking justice against Carl Lau, the owner of Airleaf, which includes restitution of our money that we invested and criminal charges for the fraudulence perpetrated on us.

This week, I had a very excellent conversation with the US Postal Inspection agency in Washington D.C. They were distressed when I told them about our plight, and very receptive. The postal inspectors can pursue criminal charges for interstate mail fraud. But this is something that requires you to take a few moments to do.

The postal form applies to people who received any mail through Airleaf via the mail, not email. Most of you have told me that you received mail from them such as promotional advertisements or your contracts through the mail. If you saved a copy of the advertisements or your contract, please print out this postal form and send it to the address listed on the second page. You will also need to include copies of any mail that you have saved. If you don’t have the envelope it came in, don’t worry about it—send what you have. To help you in this process, I am attaching a “cheat sheet” for you to print out where I will tell you line by line what to fill in.
The link for the post office form:

Post office Link:

http://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/radDocs/ps8165.pdf

This link will take you to the form that you need to PRINT OUT on your printer. There are 3 pages, but only the first two have information to be filled out. The reason for printing it out instead of doing it online is that you have to send in the hard-copy with the advertisements or contracts you received in the mail. If you have trouble doing this or don’t have a printer, please write to me and I will print it out for you and either help you fill it out and send it to you to sign or send it directly to you with the directions to fill it out. THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT STEP, so please take the few moments to do it. If the post office receives at least 10 complaints, they will most likely open an investigation through the Indiana postal inspector. Think what 100 complaints will do! Please let me know if you take this important step so I can track it by writing to me at Bonkaye@aol.com.

Also, please make sure you take the important step I asked for last week if you haven’t done so by now. I need the city and state where you live so I can compile a database for future political or press actions for us. Just hit “reply” to this email and send me that information.

For those of you who are still willing, I listed the Oprah link last week. This is important because Oprah’s producers need to receive a lot of requests from us to bring this issue to light on her show. I think it’s important for her to put pressure on the state of Indiana since we haven’t had much luck. And who knows—maybe she’ll help us with our books. You don’t know until you ask. If you do this, please send me a note letting me know you did it so I can compile the numbers

Oprah Link: OPRAH LINK

Now I will share some interesting news of the week.
From Detective Buskirk on 1/04/07:

Hi Bonnie, Have no idea why you were having problems with email. I was getting dozens all vacation. Have a couple of hundred in regards to Airleaf. (Several of our authors had written to me that the email wasn’t going through, so I forwarded it to Detective Buskirk)

I am going to be allowed to continue the case so I will be trying to wrap things up in next month or so. Hoping to present the attorney an itemized list I got from each author early next week.

Hang in there, may be good news within the month.

Jeff

I thought this was excellent news for us.

Since Martinsville now has a new mayor, I wrote him a letter on Thursday. It said:

Dear Mayor Deckard,

First, let me wish you congratulations on your re-new job, as well as a Happy New Year.

My name is Bonnie Kaye, and I am the organizer of Airleaf Victims which can be seen at www.AirleafVictims.com. I didn't want to bother you prior to the time you took office, but now that you are in, I am hoping that you will help us.

There are presently close to 350 victims, which grow daily, who are part of my group who have been fraudulently victimized by Carl Lau and Airleaf Publishing who was operating in your city. Even though the company has closed, there are numerous problems associated with this closing which include the return of people's manuscripts, galleys, disks, and books. In addition, since I estimate the fraud to be at least one million dollars at this point, we are looking to see what criminal charges will be pressed and how soon we can expect to see that happen.

We have been patiently working with Jeff Buskirk in pursuing this investigation since August. I understand that he has been reassigned, so I would appreciate it if you can give me an update that I can share with my worried victims about the status of our case and who will be handling it. Also, can you advise me who the prosecutor that will be handling this case?

We are on the verge of getting national publicity on this story, and I would like to give you a chance to give me an accurate update of what is being done and when we can expect the results. Please understand that there are many frustrated people whose lives have been destroyed through this company. I am sorry that this has taken place in your city and that you, as mayor, are now faced with resolving this problem, but you are our main hope at this point of time.

Please feel free to email me at Bonkaye@aol.com or call me at either my home at 215-288-6959 or my cell phone at 215-498-2229.

I am attaching a compilation of my weekly updates from August until the present time. I'll include you on my weekly update list that comes out on Saturdays so you can keep up with our news.

Thank you in advance for coming to our aid.
Sincerely,
Bonnie Kaye, M.Ed.
Airleaf Victims
Organizer

I didn’t want the new mayor to think that we are going to stop our campaign just because Airleaf is closed down. I haven’t received a response as of today, but if I receive one this week, I’ll share it with you in my new update.

Ron Hawkins, our reporter friend from the Martinsville Reporter, did an update story in the paper on 12/29/07. I took excerpts to share with you since a lot of the article revolved around Detective Buskirk’s comments last week which you have already read.

Excerpts from an article in the Martinsville Reporter 12/29/07

Martinsville-based vanity publisher Airleaf Publishing and Book Selling has gone out of business, but author Bonnie Kaye says that was only one part of her agenda in drawing attention to the business.Carl Lau, who had been the owner of Airleaf, acknowledged last week that his controversial printing and marketing business had closed down. Additionally in an e-mail, Martinsville Police Department Detective Jeff Buskirk informed unhappy Airleaf customers who'd contacted him that the business was shutting down.In a voice mail message seeking to arrange an interview, Lau referred to himself as being from "Airleaf or what was Airleaf, with a little help from you. I think it was on its way down, so maybe not."

In the same message, Lau said he thought the paper's coverage of his business was biased.
Kaye, the counselor and author who created Airleafvictims.com, said the closing of Airleaf was just one of her three goals. Kaye also wants to see customers' money returned and for criminal charges to be filed against Airleaf, she said."We'll be using every resource we can get," Kaye said.The FBI office in Indianapolis has been contacted and agents there encouraged Airleaf victims to continue to file complaint forms, she said.

Although the authors might be able to get their books, it will probably be at a cost, according to Buskirk's e-mail. And Lau may be starting a new business or continuing an aspect of the old business.Buskirk's involvement in the case, however, might be over with Phil Deckard, who defeated incumbent Mayor Shannon Buskirk in the May GOP primary, being sworn in as mayor Monday afternoon. Jeff and Shannon Buskirk are brothers.Deckard said Thursday that Jeff Buskirk hasn't been informed about his future as a detective. Deckard was scheduled to meet Thursday afternoon with Darrell Davis, who will become the new police chief, to discuss the matter, he said.Deckard said his administration will follow up on ongoing investigations.That could include the possibility that Lau may still be marketing a books to film business. As part of the package sold to some authors, Airleaf offered to pitch books to film executives.

Kaye and others have questioned whether this ever happened, but Lau said it was a real service Airleaf provided.In an e-mail to the Reporter-Times, Buskirk wrote, "He advised he was still talking to people about the Hollywood promotions."Multiple attempts before and after Christmas were made to contact Lau after he left a second message, but those calls weren't returned.

Let’s go back to the sentence that says, “And Lau may be starting a new business or continuing an aspect of the old business.”

I often use a saying with the women whom I counsel that goes like this:

“If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck…it’s a duck, not a goose.”

So it shouldn’t shock you when I give you this latest news revealed by one of our Airleaf Victims. Bob Denton, former Airleaf employee that had a variety of jobs ranging from shipping clerk to salesman, has now opened his own publishing business. It’s called Mountain Valley Publishing LLC. And guess where it’s located? Right inside the Airleaf building at 35 Industrial Drive in Martinsville, Indiana. You can see his new site at www.MountainValleyPublishing.com. There you will see one (1) book listed, although I’m sure that soon you will see more books from unsuspecting Airleaf Victims who don’t know what’s going on with Airleaf. I found this totally AMAZING. The one book that is presently up there states: CLICK HERE TO ORDER (We will not ask for your payment information via the Internet. Please include your name and telephone number in the body of the e-mail.)

And when you click it, up comes Bob’s email address: bdenton308@insightbb.com

Now, if something doesn’t smell rotten in the state of Indiana, then you’ve lost your sense of smell. Bob Denton is now a publisher all on his own! AMAZING! And I thought he was enjoying his unemployment benefits after leaving Airleaf, while in fact, he was setting up his new business!

Anyway, if you think that Bob isn’t working with Carl Lau, then you’ll end up being a victim once again. Learn from the past—because in Martinsville, Indiana, the past is the present.

One of our Airleaf Victims, my friend Jack Powell, author of The Art of Dying, will be featured on a program on the History Channel on Sunday, January 13, 2008 at 8 p.m. The two-hour special, called Hillbilly: The Real Story, hosted by celebrity Billy Ray Cyrus, brings these mythic people to life through stories that span 300 years. Outcast immigrants, war heroes, isolated backwoodsmen, hard working miners, fast moving moon shiners, religious warriors, musicians and statesmen make up the rugged cast of characters.

In Jack’s own words, “The show is about who pioneered America in the days when there was nothing but Appalachia regions and the mighty souls who braved the elements and hardships of America. There are several segments of moonshiners, revenuers, coal Miners, drug dealers, marijuana growers, and law enforcement efforts to curtail a multi-billion industry in an economically starved area of the country.” Jack is on throughout the show, but is featured in the last 30 minutes. He has 44 years of working in the field of law enforcement including as a policeman, revenuer, private investigator, and a deputy U.S. Marshall. In spite of having an extensive career in law enforcement, Jack is also an Airleaf Victim!

I mention his because so many people write to me saying how embarrassed they feel because they were caught up in this scam. I like to remind you that our victims come from all different walks of life including lawyers, doctors, and even an Indian chief! There are stock brokers, clergymen, counselors, psychologists, media personalities, reporters, government people, psychics, educators, blue collar workers, and retirees. Don’t feel ashamed. You were taken in by the best of professional con people. Just try not to make the same mistake twice! Remember the ducks and the goose!

With love and hope,

Bonnie Kaye

Bob Denton, Mountain Valley Publishing, LLC

2008-01-06T01:45:00.000-05:00

Dear Airleaf Friends,

In the pursuit of printing the truth, I would like to share this information that Bob Denton has sent to me:

Hi Bonnie,
i don't know where you get your information, but , it is truely wrong . Yes i am in Martinsville,In , but my address is not the same as Airleaf, nor is it in the same building. I have started my business in my home. That Address is 1420 Maple Ct. , Martinsville, In 46151. I think you should get your facts straight before you go putting FALSE information on this blog. This company was in fact started with a author who was caught up in the very problem you have addressed since August of this year. So who ever is giving you information, i would be checking them out. And no, i did not draw unemployment, because i QUIT my job. In so doing, you do not get to enjoy the benifets of unemployment. I think you have been feed some bad information by some people who were out to see the company destroyed, and that they have done just that. You were told that you had sold THOUSANDS of books, when in fact you had only sold a few hundred books. So you set out on this crusade to destroy Airleaf, and you have done that. Now if you or any of the authors in your group would like to call me, my number is 765-349-8908. I will gladly send you the LLC . I know you probably won't post this on your web blog, because it doesn't go with your cause. Thank you for your time.

Bob Denton
Mountain Valley Publishing,LLC
765-349-8908

I responded to Bob Denton with this note:

Dear Bob,
Of course I'll reprint your letter with the correct information next week. I was never told that I sold "thousands" of books, nor do I ever claim to have sold thousands of books. I am not working with anyone to destroy Airleaf except for the hundreds of authors who have been defrauded. And if you want to tell me that they are all making up stories, well, what can I say? If you would like to have an honest dialogue, I am always open to that.

Bonnie The only thing I'll retract is the location of the new business. I'll keep you posted as I investigate that further.
Bonnie Kaye

Airleaf gone but customers want money, prosecution

2008-01-02T13:21:00.000-05:00

Airleaf gone but customers want money, prosecutionLau might continue to sell Hollywood marketing

By Ronald Hawkins rhawkins@reportert.com
Saturday December 29, 2007

Martinsville

Martinsville-based vanity publisher Airleaf Publishing and Book Selling has gone out of business, but author Bonnie Kaye says that was only one part of her agenda in drawing attention to the business.

Carl Lau, who had been the owner of Airleaf, acknowledged last week that his controversial printing and marketing business had closed down. Additionally in an e-mail, Martinsville Police Department Detective Jeff Buskirk informed unhappy Airleaf customers who'd contacted him, that the business was shutting down.

In a voice mail message seeking to arrange an interview, Lau referred to himself as being from "Airleaf or what was Airleaf, with a little help from you. I think it was on its way down, so maybe not."

In the same message, Lau said he thought the paper's coverage of his business was biased.
In Buskirk's e-mail to customers, he wrote, "This is to inform you I have talked to Carl Lau. ... He has closed down. However, he and his attorney have assured me that if I provide them with a list of items to be returned, they will make them available to return disks, galleys, books etc.

"Carl told me he has 60,000 books in his facility, of which he owns only about 10,000 . The rest are yours and others who have published with him. When he receives an authors permission, he is donating books to Goodwill."

Kaye, the counselor and author who created airleafvictims.com, said the closing of Airleaf was just one of her three goals. Kaye also wants to see customers' money returned and for criminal charges to be filed against Airleaf, she said.

"We'll be using every resource we can get," Kaye said.

The FBI office in Indianapolis has been contacted and agents there encouraged Airleaf victims to continue to file complaint forms, she said.

Although the authors might be able to get their books, it will probably be at a cost, according to Buskirk's e-mail. And Lau may be starting a new business or continuing an aspect of the old business.

"I need a list of any items you want returned to you in a separate e-mail sent directly to me," Buskirk wrote. "This e-mail will be given to the attorney, so please only list what you are needing from the company.

"You may also indicate how much you feel they owe each of you, so that that can be recorded by the attorney too. Please keep the negative comments to another day, as we are trying to get each of you what we can get as we can get it.

"I will also need to know if you are willing to pay for shipping as I don't believe there will be funds to ship anything out from Airleaf and probably not from our agency. If you want to drive to Martinsville, please indicate this and I will try to set up a time in January to have a day or two where we can get this accomplished."

Buskirk added that this doesn't stop the criminal investigation.

Buskirk's involvement in the case, however, might be over with Phil Deckard, who defeated incumbent Mayor Shannon Buskirk in the May GOP primary, being sworn in as mayor Monday afternoon. Jeff and Shannon Buskirk are brothers.

"Starting January 1, 2008, I will be working the streets and no longer a detective. Political change," Buskirk wrote. "As of today, I have continued to inquire as to how this case will be handled or if I will be allowed to continue this investigation, but the new chief and administration has chosen to keep me in the dark."

Deckard said Thursday that Jeff Buskirk hasn't been informed about his future as a detective. Deckard was scheduled to meet Thursday afternoon with Darrell Davis, who will become the new police chief, to discuss the matter, he said.

Deckard said his administration will follow up on ongoing investigations.

That could include the possibility that Lau may still be marketing a books to film business. As part of the package sold to some authors, Airleaf offered to pitch books to film executives.

Kaye and others have questioned whether this ever happened, but Lau said it was a real service Airleaf provided.

In an e-mail to the Reporter-Times, Buskirk wrote, "He advised he was still talking to people about the Hollywood promotions."

Multiple attempts before and after Christmas were made to contact Lau after he left a second message, but those calls weren't returned.

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