Visiting their uncle's seaside home for the summer, a brother and sister open a mysterious trunk in a back room and discover a sinister-looking pirate puppet that comes to life and takes them captive.

Monkey has a big box, which he tells Cake has a cat inside, but only when the box is closed; Cake suggest that maybe it is a dinosaur instead, and the two friends puzzle over how they can solve the problem of finding out what is in the box, if it is always empty when opened.

Little k has an adventure with items beginning with his letter's sound, such as kittens, kingbirds, a koala, and kids in a kindergarten. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

When Hatteras Island old-timer Iola Anne Poole passes away at ninety-one, the struggling young mother in her rental cottage finds herself charged with cleaning out Iola's rambling Victorian house. Running from a messy, dangerous past, Tandi Jo Reese expects to find no more than a temporary hiding place within Iola's walls. But all that changes when she discovers eighty-one carefully decorated prayer boxes, one for each year from Iola's youth to her...

Little c has an adventure with items beginning with her letter's sound, such as a cat, a canary, and a clown in a castle. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

Little l has an adventure with items beginning with his letter's sound, such as lizards, a little lion, and a lighthouse by the lake. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

Little h has an adventure with items beginning with his letter's sound, such as a hen, a horse, a hog, and a helicopter. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

Little f has an adventure with items beginning with her letter's sound, such as four fish, five fat frogs, and a funny fox. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

Little j has an adventure with items beginning with his letter's sound, such as jackrabbits, a jack-o'-lantern, and a jaguar in the jungle. Additional features to aid comprehension include rebus icons for word recognition, a word list for review, activities for further learning, a note to parents and educators, and an introduction to the author and illustrator.

A young woman discovers a delicious cache of heirlooms in an abandoned safe deposit box: bundles of handwritten letters, photographs, expired passports, both American and Italian, and twenty-two leather boxes, each holding a priceless piece of jewelry. Drawn to the mysterious woman in the photographs, Jane digs deeper into the woman's luxurious, golden life and the older, dashing man who occupies her pictures and letters. The details are both glamorous...