The urban blogging parents at Sweet Juniper have upped the ante on urban alphabet books. Avoiding the trite apples and boa constrictors, they didn't just set the alphabet in the city, but used urban graffiti of hipster parent appropriate images. Look for H is for Homeless, I is for Icarus, and J is for Jew. They just did this for themselves, but due to popular demand, have made copies available for purchase via lulu, the self-publishing site. Inspired, I sought out the other great Urban Alphabet Books: The classic Alphabet City by Stephen T. Johnson offers photo-realistic still-lifes depicting "found" letters in the urban landscape. In Alphabet City:Out in the Streets Michael De Feo created beautiful, graphic posters of the alphabet and pasted them on city streets, then photographed them. ABC NYC is an alphabet of the things NYC kids really need to know: A is for Atlas, B is for Bagel, C is for Chrysler Building. Museum ABC by The Metropolitan Museum of Art isn't the most inventive ABC book??”A is for Apple and all that??”but it is a nice introduction to the great works of art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art and you can take the book with you to the Museum and use it to hunt down the paintings in the book for a fun museum experience. The Absolutely Awful Alphabet by Mordicai Gerstein takes ABCs to the dark side where C is for Cantankerous and F is for Ferocious, it's sure to delight naughty urban children and parents alike. And one for the grown-ups??”Alphabet City by Geoffrey Biddle. Biddle photographed life in the Puerto Rican Lower East Side in the 70s and 80s and through interviews with locals, records what life was like there. A wonderful snapshot and a striking reminder of how much NYC has changed in such a short time. For more NYC-related book recommendations check out our store.