To guide and inspire believers, innumerable symbols and images were made, beginning in India in the 3rd century BC. This phenomenally diverse tradition includes not only frescoes, relief carvings, colossal statues, silk embroideries and bronze ritual objects but also rock-cut shrines with a thousand Buddhas, the glorious stupas of South-East Asia and the pagodas of the Far East, the massive "mandala in stone" of Borobudur in Java and entire 13th-century temple complexes at Angkor in Cambodia. The author describes all the Buddhist schools and cultures, and explains their imagery, from Tibetan...

Professor Mitchell Cameron was quite content existing as he was, numb, uncaring, and uninvolved. He had given up on anything that might awaken his senses, except for Jessie...he believed in Jessie. He loved her. But Jessie's view of life was quite different from his...she cared too much about everything, which is too much for anyone. In the end, she felt so empty from trying so hard, it finally killed her. Now all Mitchell had left was his loss. He felt no rage or disgust, just numb...until that one day. He walked into the woods, as he had many times before, but this time things were very...