Spanning a range of locales, time periods, themes, and styles, no two stories here are alike. Told subtly and with empathy, the stories are multifaceted and multilayered and explore a wide range of subjects, such as the following: • The complex emotions of a growing-up boy as he observes a young woman’s bright life being blighted by her jealous sister. • Innocent children watch uncomprehendingly the misfortunes of a woman whom they love. She is an unintended victim of her feudal master’s machinations. • The unconventional but abiding love of two girls for each other, with the witness to their lives having issues of her own. • Age, greed, and time ruining a once-beautiful house and its proud owner • The delusional aspirations of a woman and her bewildering inner world. • An ageing woman seeing herself and the life spent in the mirror of modernity and seeking change. • An endearing story of a child-bride of earlier times. • A young woman overcoming induced prejudices and rediscovering the preciousness of a once-spurned relationship. The stories infuse newness into many enduring and vast themes, like relationships, prejudices, a judgmental society, of changing conventions, and in general, of life as it goes on.