Synopsis: Publisher's Description: Anne Sheldon's heroines have lowered eyes and seditious smiles. They are people of folklore and fairy tales: Penelope, the Crane Maiden, the Fates. Her heroes are outsiders in their own stories rumplestiltskin and Arachne's father. These fourteen story-poems and stories focus on the work that women do with spinning wheel, spindle, and knitting needles. They are accompanied by evocative images of these instruments and the cloth they yield In addition to reworking well-known fairy tales, she has several shining tales of her own making. Under the fluid sign of danger and domesticity, Anne Sheldon explores earthly and ethereal regions of the feminine.