'Since she was valorous, she said she was a man, and since Mahishan was speaking of love, he was feminine... If she was a combination of feminine and masculine qualities, why could he too not be a combination of the masculine and feminine?' Setting the stage with the Asura Mahishan's doomed love for the beautiful Devi, Ambai deftly combines myth and tradition with contemporary situations. In the title story, the woman who is mother, daughter, solver of all problems for her family, finds that it is only a black spider on a wall in a deserted guesthouse with whom she can share her own pain and suffering; in Burdensome Days, Bhramara enters a world of politics that turns her music into a commodity; while in A Moon to Devour, it is through her lover's mother that Sagu learns that marriage is not a necessity for motherhood. Like the strains of the veena that play again and again in this masterful concert of stories, journeys too weave in and out. By train or bus or autorickshaws, each journey takes one into a different facet of human nature: the power of caste over the most basic of bodily needs like thirst; the simple generosity of a mentally afflicted child who loves the colour blue; the loneliness of dying amongst strangers, and the final journey of a veena whose owner herself had gone before it into another world. As in most of her writing, women are central to Ambai's stories, but so too is her deep understanding of, as she puts it, 'the pulls and tensions' between the many different things that make up life and ultimately, create a story.

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A powerful ring. A dangerous web. When Maria inherits a strange, spider-shaped ring from her grandmother, she doesn't realize she's also inheriting a strange power -- the power to control spiders and have them do whatever she wants. This is a pretty cool thing when it comes to fetching objects from another room . . . or if Maria wants to use the spiders to get back at some mean kids in her class. But the power comes with a price. Maria has attracted the attention of the Black Widow -- who is trying to collect all the spider magic for herself. The Black Widow is not going to let anything stand in her way -- especially not Maria.The story of the ring is being woven like a web -- and Maria is going to have to do everything she can to not get trapped within it.

An NYRB Classics Original It is a sunny summer Sunday in a remote Swiss village, and a christening is being celebrated at a lovely old farmhouse. One of the guests notes an anomaly in the fabric of the venerable edifice: a blackened post that has been carefully built into a trim new window frame. Thereby hangs a tale, one that, as the wise old grandfather who has lived all his life in the house proceeds to tell it, takes one chilling turn after another, while his audience listens in appalled silence. Featuring a cruelly overbearing lord of the manor and the oppressed villagers who must render him service, an irreverent young woman who will stop at nothing, a mysterious stranger with a red beard and a green hat, and, last but not least, the black spider, the tale is as riveting and appalling today as when Jeremias Gotthelf set it down more than a hundred years ago. The Black Spider can be seen as a parable of evil in the heart or of evil at large in society (Thomas Mann saw it as foretelling the advent of Nazism), or as a vision, anticipating H. P. Lovecraft, of cosmic horror. There’s no question, in any case, that it is unforgettably creepy.

#1 New York Times Bestseller “Funny and smart as hell” (Bill Gates), Allie Brosh’s Hyperbole and a Half showcases her unique voice, leaping wit, and her ability to capture complex emotions with deceptively simple illustrations. FROM THE PUBLISHER: Every time Allie Brosh posts something new on her hugely popular blog Hyperbole and a Half the internet rejoices. This full-color, beautifully illustrated edition features more than fifty percent new content, with ten never-before-seen essays and one wholly revised and expanded piece as well as classics from the website like, “The God of Cake,” “Dogs Don’t Understand Basic Concepts Like Moving,” and her astonishing, “Adventures in Depression,” and “Depression Part Two,” which have been hailed as some of the most insightful meditations on the disease ever written. Brosh’s debut marks the launch of a major new American humorist who will surely make even the biggest scrooge or snob laugh. We dare you not to. FROM THE AUTHOR: This is a book I wrote. Because I wrote it, I had to figure out what to put on the back cover to explain what it is. I tried to write a long, third-person summary that would imply how great the book is and also sound vaguely authoritative—like maybe someone who isn’t me wrote it—but I soon discovered that I’m not sneaky enough to pull it off convincingly. So I decided to just make a list of things that are in the book: Pictures Words Stories about things that happened to me Stories about things that happened to other people because of me Eight billion dollars* Stories about dogs The secret to eternal happiness* *These are lies. Perhaps I have underestimated my sneakiness!

Exploring themes of personal loss, sexuality, identity and selfhood, and a quest for meaning in a fluid world, this collection of short stories by Ambai articulates the real experience of women and communicates their silences in words and images.

Carlos Whittaker equips you with practical steps to destroying the roots of your deep-seated habits so you can get rid of what's holding you back and embrace true freedom in Christ. Are you tired of trying to live for Christ--only to fail time and time again with the same old behaviors? Do you pray for guidance, ask for deliverance, and vow to do better, yet fail to progress? As an author, speaker, podcaster, and communicator for our time, Carlos has lived much of his spiritual life in the spotlight. But, like any Christian, his faith story has had its ups and downs. He spent decades trying to figure out how to be a "better person." Time and time again, he strived for holiness, only to get caught in a cycle of destructive habits, behaviors, and thought patterns. But the buck stops here. Or, rather, the spider is killed here. Throughout Kill the Spider, Carlos walks you through the key aspects of killing the spiders in your own life, including: Confessing the lies you've believed Renouncing the lies that have held you back Rejecting every lie that Jesus has exposed to you Replacing these lies with Jesus's truth In Kill the Spider, Carlos shares everything from hilarious, self-deprecating stories to passion-filled wisdom to teach us that we can't just clear away the pesky cobwebs. Instead, we need to find the spider--the source of the issue--and take it out entirely. Carlos offers a breath of fresh air to any believer looking to finally step into the freedom in Christ. Take a seat, open up your book, and grab a shoe. We're going on a spider hunt.

Die Schwarze Spinne is a religious allegory about morals and religious living in the mid-nineteenth century, written by Jeremias Gotthelf. This work is an interlinear translation of Gotthelf's Die Schwarze Spinne with introductions to both the author and the work itself. In a small Swiss community, a baptism is the backdrop for a village elder to tell the story of his family and their life and death struggle with the devil himself. The elder relates the story of a knight and his ill treatment of the farmers of the area. The knight's inhuman demands upon the peasants bring about unforeseen consequences, which lead to the decimation of the village and, ultimately, the knight's own death. The plague released through a pact with the devil, the black spider, haunts the village for hundreds of years and must be fought with religious piety, courage, and devotion to traditional values. It is when one forgets God and his commandments that the black spider is at its most deadly. A true tale of morality written by a pastor in 1842, The Black Spider serves as a warning to those who, according to Gotthelf, go against the will of God.

An industrious spider spends her days and nights spinning perfect webs.

On the sun-drenched Riviera, where the rich and powerful gather to indulge in luxury and leisure, a shadow lurks beneath the glimmering surface. A notorious thief, known only as The Black Spider, has embarked on a spree of audacious heists, targeting the glittering jewels of Europe’s elite. Having evaded all the layers of security, bypassing guards, alarms, and locks, without leaving any sign of forced entry or exit, the Spider leaves behind a calling card: a crude drawing of a black spider, taunting his victims and the authorities alike. Enter Reginald Cosway, a shrewd and relentless detective who is determined to unmask the Spider and bring an end to the reign of terror gripping the Riviera. As the Spider continues to strike with impunity, Cosway is drawn into a deadly game of cat and mouse, where every move could be his last. First published in 1911, Carlton Dawe’s thrilling novel was subsequently adapted for both the stage and big screen.