A celebration of one of the most rich and varied landscapes in Europe, here are thirty-six villages and towns from all over Tuscany chosen both for their intrinsic beauty and for the part they have played in Tuscan history.

This book features 101 towns that represent the twenty diverse regions of Italy and their varied landscapes.

Shows and describes the southwestern region of France also known as the Perigord

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The beloved memoir of self-discovery set against the spectacular Tuscan countryside that inspired the major motion picture starring Diane Lane—now in a twentieth-anniversary edition featuring a new afterword “This beautifully written memoir about taking chances, living in Italy, loving a house and, always, the pleasures of food, would make a perfect gift for a loved one. But it’s so delicious, read it first yourself.”—USA Today For more Frances Mayes, including a tour of her now iconic Cortona home, Bramasole, watch PBS’s Dream of Italy: Tuscan Sun Special! More than twenty years ago, Frances Mayes—widely published poet, gourmet cook, and travel writer—introduced readers to a wondrous new world when she bought and restored an abandoned Tuscan villa called Bramasole. Under the Tuscan Sun inspired generations to embark on their own journeys—whether that be flying to a foreign country in search of themselves, savoring one of the book’s dozens of delicious seasonal recipes, or simply being transported by Mayes’s signature evocative, sensory language. Now with a new afterword from Frances Mayes, the twentieth-anniversary edition of Under the Tuscan Sun revisits the book’s most popular characters.

A lavishly illustrated ode to the joys of Tuscany’s people, food, landscapes, and art, from the bestselling author of Under the Tuscan Sun and See You in the Piazza “A love letter to Italy written in precise and passionate language of near-poetic density.”—Newsday In Tuscany celebrates the abundant pleasures of life in Italy as it is lived at home, at festivals, feasts, restaurants and markets, in the kitchen and on the piazza, in the vineyards, fields, and olive groves. Combining essays by Frances Mayes and a chapter by her husband, poet Edward Mayes, with more than 200 full-color photos by photographer Bob Krist, each of this book's five sections highlights a signature aspect of Tuscan life: La Piazza: the locus of Italian village life. With photographs of the shop signs, the outdoor markets, medieval streets, people, their pets and their cars, and snippets of conversations overheard, Mayes reveals the life of the Piazza in her town of Cortona as well as out-of-the-way places such as Volterra, Asciano, Monte San Savino, and Castelmuzio. La Festa: the celebration. Essays and photos of feasts and celebrations, such as the Christmas dinner for twenty-seven at a neighbor's house and a donkey race around the church at Montepulciano Stazione, illustrate how the Tuscans celebrate the seasons--their open ways of friendship, their connection to nature, and most of all, their sense of abundance. Il Campo: the field. Here Edward Mayes evokes the deep sense of the shift of seasons as he picks olives before he and Frances head off to the olive oil mill and enjoy the first bruscette with new oil. La Cucina: the kitchen. An intimate view of the all-important role of the kitchen in Tuscan culture, including photographs of her own kitchen and gardens, menus from great local cooks, the elements of the Tuscan table, dishes with cultural and culinary notes on each, and, of course, delectable recipes. La Bellezza: the beauty. From the quality of the light falling on sublime landscapes in different seasons and Tuscan faces in moments of laughter to a silhouette of cypress trees in the early evening and a wild bird perched on a neigbor's head, In Tuscany features views of beauty that reveal the singular splendor of one of the world's best-loved and most artistic regions.

Imagine that you are standing on a vantage point at the edge of a Tuscan hill village: you are gazing over one of the richest and most varied landscapes in Europe. Here are vineyards producing some of the world's finest wines, and a panorama of wild mountain grandeur. Your view will almost certainly take in other villages clustering around the upper reaches of some hill, or the russet roofs of a fortified town deep in a valley. These elegant yet intimate places are captured in Hugh Palmer's stunning photographs, making this a calendar for more than just the present. All the vividness of this ever-popular and entrancing part of Italy is here, from the north, around Florence and Lucca, to the villages of the south. Ancient churches, themselves art treasure-houses, contrast with mighty castles, monuments to the pomp and pageantry of times gone by. Then there are the streets of picturesque and elegant houses, punctuated with tiny squares, perhaps the scene of a bustling market or the site of a fine Renaissance fountain. Already acknowledged as some of the finest photography of this enchanted region, the new selection of illustrations in this calendar will provide month-by month inspiration for the appreciation of the fine things in life.

Preeminent Florentine photographer Massimo Listri uncovers the great public as well as private Tuscan treasures in this unprecedented, oversize, and deluxe volume. Celebrating Tuscany's renowned art and architecture, elegance, and charm, this unique volume unveils the finest Tuscan gems, both the famous as well as the hidden. Photographer Massimo Listri's unique access affords this resplendent publication of Tuscany's great treasures, including the architecture, art, and artistry of its frescoes, churches, palazzi, and gardens, as well as previously unseen private residence interiors, chapels, villas, and estates. This oversize and deluxe volume features stunning gatefolds and showcases four hundred sumptuous color and large-format photographs. From Florence to its surrounding areas, such as San Gimignano, Arezzo, Pisa, Siena, Montepulciano, Chianti, Lucca, and Pistoia, this book culls from Listri's rich vault of visually stunning and historically noteworthy material to create a privileged journey through which Tuscany is at once marvelously displayed. Tuscany is a superb piece of art to be enjoyed by both Italian art and culture connoisseurs as well as those discovering the region for the first time.

WHEN STEFANO AND THE CHRISTMAS MIRACLES was published a few years ago, it was praised as “a touching and richly told piece that invites you to pull up a chair and listen in to a trove of family stories filled with tradition and insight.” Another reviewer wrote, “Love love love this book. So many wonderful lessons for little children and adults to learn,” and a third said the book “transcends nationalities and is ultimately a relationship book about the special bond a young boy shares with his grandfather.” THE BOY STEFANO and his grandfather return in this sequel, with Stefano and his family moving to a house in a beautifully preserved medieval piazza. Nonno transports Stefano to the Middle Ages with stories about dukes and peasants, knights and saints, pilgrims and ghosts, glorious feasts and bloody battles. The reader, too, is carried back to another time, another place.