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Standing sentinel in the treetops, stealing stray French fries and generally causing a racket, the fearless ravens of Flagstaff are a familiar sight to residents. But what hijinks might a gang of ravens get into on a typical day while narrowly escaping the feline and vehicular dangers of modern life?

Over the course of 18 pages, author J. Norman Grim follows the adventures of a raven named Hops Sideways in A Gang of Ravens Came to Lunch as the bird searches for a bite to eat with his family.

The day begins with Hops Sideways opening his eyes to find himself hanging upside down from a branch, foreshadowing the wacky day he is about to encounter.

Grim, a Flagstaff resident and retired biology professor at Northern Arizona University, developed the idea for the book with help from his late wife Carole, to whom he was married for 61 years. Grim said completing this book was his way of honoring her, and she is given co-author credit. Their son Stephen also has a cameo in the story as a grocery store delivery driver whose food is stolen by the gang.

A Gang of Ravens Came to Lunch was self-published through Author House, the same platform Grim used to publish his heavily researched nonfiction book To Fly the Gentle Giants: The Training of U.S. WW II Glider Pilots in 2009.