Book excerpt: A compilation of remarkable letters with love at their heart, from the curator of the globally popular Letters of Note website. The first volume in the bestselling Letters of Note series was a collection of hundreds of the world's most entertaining, inspiring, and unusual letters, based on the seismically popular website of the same name--an online museum of correspondence visited by over 70 million people. From Virginia Woolf's heartbreaking suicide letter, to Queen Elizabeth II's recipe for drop scones sent to President Eisenhower; from the first recorded use of the expression 'OMG' in a letter to Winston Churchill, to Gandhi's appeal for calm to Hitler; and from Iggy Pop's beautiful letter of advice to a troubled young fan, to Leonardo da Vinci's remarkable job application letter. Now, the curator of Letters of Note, Shaun Usher, gives us wonderful new volumes featuring letters organized around a universal theme. In this volume, Shaun Usher turns to the subject of love. What emotion inspires humans to put pen to paper more than love? It's unsurprising that love letters provide an endless source of extraordinary writing. Letters of Note: Love gathers together some of the most powerful messages about love ever composed, whether inspired by love's first blush or the recriminations at its ending, the regrets of unrequited feelings and the joys of passions known. Includes letters by Zora Neale Hurston, Napoleon Bonaparte, Frida Kahlo, Nelson Mandela, and many more.