Vamos Amigos

In 1565, the young Spaniard Juan de Guaras receives an exquisite brooch in the shape of a Maltese cross from his parents to commemorate his becoming a Knight in the Order of St. John. But within four months de Guaras dies in the defense of Fort St. Elmo against the Ottoman Turks during the Great Siege of Malta; and the brooch meant for his beloved, Maria, and their son-is lost to history. By chance, 450 years after the siege, watercolors commissioned by the Order in the 17th century for their ledger are on display for the first time in the Museum of Fine Arts in Valletta. Kiyoko Bartolo, a professor from the University of Tokyo who specializes in jewelry of the European Renaissance, recognizes the drawing of de Guaras' brooch. Famous throughout history not only for its magnificent gems, but as a key to the wealth that de Guaras had obtained as a corsair raiding the richly laden merchant ships of the sultan, Suleiman, the Magnificent. Kiyoko learns that it was last recorded in 1923 when the Communist Party inventoried the jewelry belonging to the Russian royal family that was held in the Hermitage. Twenty years later, during the German Siege of Leningrad in World War Two, it mysteriously disappears. Kiyoko, determined to locate the Maltese brooch, enlists European colleagues she's befriended during Renaissance seminars to assist her in her search. However, the closer they come to finding the brooch, the more resistance and violence they meet from unknown parties who want the brooch, and its secrets, for themselves....

The present compilation of ballads from the Mexican states of Guerrero and Oaxaca documents one of the world's great traditions of heroic song, a tradition that has thrived continuously for the last hundred years. The 107 corridos presented here, gathered during ethnographic research over a period of twenty-five years in settlements on Mexico's Costa Chica and Costa Grande, offer a window into the ethos of heroism among the cultures of Mexico's southwestern coast, a region that has been plagued by recurrent cycles of violence. John Holmes McDowell presents a richly annotated field collection of corridos, accompanied by musical scores and transcriptions and translations of lyrics. In addition to his interpretation of the corridos' depiction of violence and masculinity, McDowell situates the songs in historical and performance contexts, illuminating the Afro-mestizo influence in this distinctive population.

Bob Jackson, a young New York newsman, went to California with purpose to investigate a retired hit man’s life story that led him an idea to go to El Paso ,Texas, for details of the hiding border truth; his fate put him into the net connecting drug cartels and law enforcement forces on the both sides of the United States and Mexican border down to Rosario, Argentina, where Sinoloa cartel from Mexico began to establish its new drug paradise with support of new raised local cartel Los Monos; a story tells you how an innocent newsman turned to be a DEA agent but when man makes plan, God used to make steps. This is an imaginary tale that reflects the similar situation had affected the whole American earth for many decades and that just likes an invisible killer hiding inside the whole Pan American soil.... People lost their own liberty while money talks.

Read Along or Enhanced eBook: When four friends head off to the park, careful planning rules the day.

Soraya is a high school student who is forced to enter a sordid and dangerous world of pornography and abuse.