These are changing times, and here is the new encyclopedia of manners to guide us confidently and correctly through the maze of lifestyles, customs, and ways of relating to others that hallmark this decade. Much of the information in this book is new, because many of the situations it discusses have not existed as social norms before.

Letitia Baldrige is uniquely qualified to offer this timely advice. Universally recognized as the country's leading authority on manners and social relationships, she has been hailed on the cover of Time magazine as "America's leading arbiter of manners" and is regularly celebrated for the same expertise in the media.

Ms. Baldrige's book provides authoritative answers to questions about manners no one has had to ask before. Among them, the protocol involved in all the new family relationships -- stepfamilies, adult children returning home, and elderly parents moving in; child visitation problems and other complications of divorce; the new codes concerning sex and dating and women taking the initiative romantically; and men and women traveling together on business. She provides unique counsel on rearing children to say "no" to drugs, alcohol, and other destructive temptations and to have the exemplary manners that lead to success.

The book is also a complete updated guide to everything you need to know to handle the traditional rites and passages of life in line with current thinking (much of which is different from that of the past). This includes detailed information on weddings, funerals, and religious ceremonies; entertaining any number of people -- from one to one thousand; today's table manners, table setting, and table service;etiquette at work; proper forms of address for these times; and everything you need to know to converse easily in person or on the telephone, to write appropriate letters and notes for every occasion, and much more.

These are real manners for real people in today's complex world. Letitia Baldrige calls them "manners from the heart," and if you have such manners, the world will be with you.