Trained sociologist and photographer Marrigje de Maar (born 1944) seeks out those magical households in which families have come together for generations--where life has "worn itself into" a house. Over the course of five trips to China, she photographed housing in Chinese communes that had been scheduled for demolition, finding within them a surprising diversity of types and uses of classical living spaces.

Elize DeVries was hired by The Strathmann Academy of Music in the summer of her fifteenth year. Joseph Strathmann sends talent scouts throughout the United States to find extremely talented young musicians. They look for the youngsters whose neighbors say, "That kid plays better than any famous person I ever heard." Each summer twelve to sixteen young talents are invited to spend the summer at Herr Strathmann's estate "Riverwind" in upper New York County. Special instructors assist the youngsters hone their talent. Elize was hired to be a counselor for the students- involve them in tea each afternoon and a social time in the evening. She was also Girl Friday for Herr Strathmann. The summer of 1903 proved to be a special time for sixteen students and Elize as they lived at Riverwind and discovered more than their musical abilities.

"2010, New York City. Thomas Cunningam, a lively and troubled sixteen years old boy, after being kicked out of the school because of a fight with a classmate, is forced to attend one of the most prestigious boarding school of the whole world: Collegio Montevcatini-Montebello-Italy. Apparently, the first night, everything seems going great. everything seems so different from what he thought. he feels attracted by the atmosphere of the place, he loves that majestic piece of hystory and he likes his new, easy-going and nice friends. but he doesn't know anything about her... "The Fresher" is inspired by one of the most terrifying and frightening legend of whole Europe: Azzurrina's legend. While travelling through the thousand mysteries of Montebello, the reader is gonna be embraced by a captivating and dark atmosphere."