Award-winning children's book author, Robin L. Gordon, presents another soothing, inspirational book to comfort children as they contemplate leaving their beloved cuddlies at home. Sophia is about to begin kindergarten, but should she take her stuffed puppy, Mackenzie, and Blankie with her? "Mackenzie and Blankie" is a heartwarming story highlighting the struggle that Sophia has with her mother about leaving her precious Mackenzie, and Blankie, as she prepares for this major milestone. Honest and relatable, this children's picture book will be the "go-to" for parents and teachers as they help children transition into elementary school. A Foreword, by author and psychoanalyst Dr. Paul C. Horton, discusses current research findings about the effects of "transitional objects" on children's growth and development. An Afterword offers parents several options on how to encourage their children to discreetly take, or leave their cuddlies safely behind.

The thirty-eight urban gems covered here range from newly created linear spaces along the water's edge, such as Brooklyn Bridge Park and the East River Waterfront Esplanade, to revitalized squares and circles, such as those at Gansevoort Plaza in the Meatpacking District and Columbus Circle, to repurposed open spaces like the freight tracks, now the High Line, and Concrete Plant Park in the Bronx. Readers can discover midtown atriums, mingle with the crowds in Union Square, travel offshore to nearby Governors Island, and enjoy the vistas of historic Green-Wood Cemetery. Pete Hamill writes in his foreword, "I've . . . made a list of new places I must visit while there is time. With any luck at all, I'll see all of them. I hope you, the reader, can find the time too." Concise descriptions, helpful maps, and vivid photographs capture the New York urban scene.

The Municipal Art Society of New York recently celebrated its fiftieth year of offering walking tours to the public; in 2007 more than 10,000 people participated. This illustrated guidebook to highlights of architecture, preservation, urban planning, and public art described by two experienced guides, with pictures, route maps, and travel information, covers Manhattan from downtown skyscrapers to Harlem by way of Madison Square, Art Deco Midtown, Grand Central Terminal, Columbus Circle, Central Park, and more.

When Nikki Evans steps in to help out her musician friend Richard in Helen, Georgia, she has no idea that in a matter of just a few hours, her entire world will be turned upside down. By a man, at that Entrepreneur and former military pilot Joe Lewis comes to Helen on business with his army buddy Doug Lawson. The decision to walk into that club for a few beers will bring unexpected disarray to his once-ordered life when the sultry singer in the band catches his eye. See what happens when the simple words, No strings, put strings on everything. Follow the action through the streets of Helen, Georgia, and Abbeville, South Carolina, and get to know Nikki, the feisty sister of the beloved Larson Evans from Love Never Ends, in No Strings, Book Two of the Festival Series.

Book One in the Festival Series... Larson Evans is a high powered attorney. He lives in Boston with his teenage daughter. He has never forgotten the woman who walked out of his life the day after their daughter was born. Margo Evans lives in a small town in South Carolina. She has blended in nicely during the past eight years, but she has never forgotten the husband and daughter she left behind so many years ago. When a working vacation brings Larson to the very town where his wife has been living, will he be able to overlook her abandonment, so that they can find their way back to each other again? Other characters and strong southern values mix with these two star-crossed lovers, with just a dash of humor added for fun, this book gives the reader an insight to a love that endures everything.

I am Robin. I hated the name when I was little. For one thing Miss Joe on Romper Room never saw me in her magic mirror, and I waited every day for her to ask me if I had fun at play. For another thing, all of the Robin's I had heard of were boys. I loved frilly dresses and shiny shoes, and long princess hair. I had a pixie hair cut and this ridiculous name. My mother said, "What do you wish I would have named you?" Without hesitation I said "Star," the most beautiful, ethereal name I could think of at the age of three. I got used to my name through the years, and even decided I liked it. The surprise came when I decided to find out what my name meant in one of those baby books where you can look up the name and find the meaning. Robin is a derivative of the male name, Robert and it means "Bright, of shining fame," or in other words, a star. My mother named me what I wanted after all. It just took me awhile to figure it out.

This volume presents in translation 100 previously unknown letters of Ippolita Maria Sforza (1445–1488), daughter of the Duke of Milan, who was sent at age twenty to marry the son of the infamously brutal King Ferrante of Naples. Sforza’s letters display the adroit diplomacy she used to strengthen the alliance between Milan and Naples, then the two most powerful states in Italy, amid such grave crises as her brother’s assassination in Milan and the Turkish invasion of Otranto. Still, Ippolita lived as a hostage at the Neapolitan court, subject not only to the threat of foreign invasion but also to her husband’s well-known sexual adventures and her father-in-law’s ruthlessness. Soon after Ippolita’s mysterious death in 1488, the fraught Naples-Milan alliance collapsed.