If I were to have a special dedication, it would be to the late John C. Bailar, Jr.,
my Ph.D. mentor. John piqued my interest in the stereochemistry of monomeric
coordination compounds initially, and his statement regarding the apparent
impossibility of preparing soluble metal coordination polymers of high molecular
mass became a challenge that twenty years later put me on the quest for the
soluble eight-coordinate polymers. You will find the successful results sprinkled
throughout this book.