title: Spiderweb: A Novel
author:  Penelope Lively 
description: "Lively cuts to the complex heart of human emotion and motivation.... Carefully thought out and exceedingly smart". -- PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER<br /><br />"Understated and elegant....Penelope Lively makes a strong case for risk-taking in one's personal life and for allowing oneself to get entwined in spiderwebs of other people's making." --"Wall Street Journal""Her work is invariably intelligent, thoughtful, humane and far deeper than first impressions might suggest....a fine work of fiction." --Jonathan Yardley, "Washington Post""Clever, low-key and deeply observant." --"Seattle Times""Lively cuts to the complex heart of human emotion and motivation....Carefully thought out and exceedingly smart." --"Philadelphia Inquirer""Lively's perceptive vision about the insularity of modern life rings true." --"Publishers Weekly""A strong addition to the already impressive list of Lively's fictional accomplishments....A quietly compelling drama with many shades of sadness, this is also a scrupulous portrait, both honest and sympathetic, of the proverbial rolling stone." --"Kirkus Reviews" (starred)"Penelope Lively's latest novel has the usual wonderful Lively strengths: gentle, intelligent, seamlessly written. Any jangled reader can find solace in her prose....Lively's a great writer." --"Boston Globe""Any fan of Penelope Lively will find familiarity and comfort in her latest novel, Spiderweb....Lively has a keen eye for detail and an authority in her writing that is admirable." --"Providence Sunday Journal""A splendid novel...I hated to see the last of Stella." --"Trenton Times"
zlib_text: **The Parkerstown Delegate**
  
   **By**
  
   **Grace Livingston Hill**
  
   **Chapter 1**
  
  The shadows are long and low on the grass, the sleepy road is muddy, the
  chestnuts look expectantly down from the laden tree with their eager, prickly
  faces, all ready to leap when the frost shall give the word, the river glides
  dreamily along, and the rusty-throated crickets sing and sing the whole day. A
  busy gray spider works hard to finish certain meshes on the railing of the
  upper porch. Nothing makes any difference to her any way. She builds her house
  in a convenient place for catching flies, and when that house fails or breaks
  she builds another, so on to the end, and then it is all over.
  
  Two men come down the road in blue jeans overalls and checked blouses. One is
  big, with a large neck and no collar, a sunburned face lengthening into sandy
  whiskers, a broad, coarse, straw hat and hands in his pockets. The other is
  younger, with a pleasant face, a manly figure and a spade over his shoulder.
  They