Product Description

In the small town of Tall Pine, Minnesota, at the Cup O’Delight Cafe, the townsfolk gather for what they call the Tall Pine Polka, an event in which heavenly coffee, good food, and that feeling of being alive among friends inspires both body and soul to dance. There’s the cafe owner, the robust and beautiful Lee O’Leary, who escaped to the northwoods from an abusive husband; Miss Penk and Frau Katt, the town’s only lesbian couple (“Well, we’re za only ones who admit it.”); Pete, proprietor of the Shoe Shack, who spends nights crafting beautiful shoes to present to Lee, along with his declarations of love; Mary, whose bad poetry can clear out the cafe in seconds flat; and, most important of all, Lee’s best friend, Fenny Ness, a smart and sassy twenty-two-year-old going on eighty.

When Hollywood rolls into Tall Pine to shoot a movie, and a handsome musician known as Big Bill appears on the scene, Lee and Fenny find their friendship put to the test, as events push their hearts in unexplored directions—where endings can turn into new beginnings. . . .

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #453611 in Books
• Published on: 2001-05-29
• Released on: 2001-05-29
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

From Amazon.com
Balanced on the remote edge of the boundary waters in northern Minnesota, the Cup o' Delight Café is home to a motley crew of locals. Drawn to the addictive coffee and the equally addictive company, the customers share the fortunes of life together. Having left the dangers of the big city and an abusive husband behind, owner Lee O'Leary helps guide and inspire her friends, particularly Fenny Ness. There seems to be no problem that Lee or her coffee can't solve.

Then Hollywood arrives and chooses the town of Tall Pine as the setting--and Fenny as the star--of a new film. With the encouragement of her friends, Fenny overcomes her inhibitions and agrees to act. To add to the general excitement, a handsome stranger arrives in town. Big Bill has qualities that draw both Lee and Fenny to him; as their world turns upside down, Lee and Fenny struggle to balance loyalty and happiness.

Author Lorna Landvik has won acclaim for her blend of quirky humor and bittersweet realizations. As in her earlier novels, Patty Jane's House of Curl and Your Oasis on Flame Lake, Landvik juxtaposes a slapstick sense of rural Minnesota with humble and human pathos. Unrequited love, personal insecurity, and post-traumatic stress disorder may not be the most original sources of profundity, but Landvik builds her characters' growth like layers of translucent watercolor, and ultimately creates a complex and endearing novel. --Nancy R.E. O'Brien

From Publishers Weekly
Having previously created beguiling characters in Patty Jane's House of Curl and Your Oasis on Flame Lake, Landvik invites readers to belly up to the counter and join the regulars sipping coffee at Cup O'Delight Caf? in Tall Pine, Minn. In this swift-moving romp, Lee O'Leary, the Cup O'Delight owner, is a 210-lb., 40-year-old redhead who fetched up in this north woods tourist town three years ago while fleeing her abusive stockbroker husband. Lee's coffee shop is the daily rendezvous for idiosyncratic locals: shoemaker Pete, suffering unrequited love for Lee; Mary Gore, famous for her bad poetry; Slim, the barking 'Nam vet; and lesbian couple Frau Katte and Miss Penk. When Hollywood invades Tall Pine, the eccentric population triples. Location scouts for a grade-B flick, Ike and Inga, find their perfect leading lady in the book's central figure, 22-year-old Fenny Ness. Ever since her adventurous parents died in an accident in Belize, Fenny has run the local bait and craft shops. Fenny is reluctant, but her friends persuade her to take the Hollywood plunge. Lacking guile or malice, plainspoken Fenny transforms the Hollywood types, standing up to a tyrannical director, flooring more than one nasty talk-show host, and making life-long friends of the other actors. Meanwhile, Fenny struggles to win and keep the man she loves: Big Bill, a half-Polynesian, half-Chippewa musician and athlete, who floats into town to reconnect with his Indian heritage and stirs up romantic rivalries between Fenny and Lee. The endless nattering of Landvik's locals (the tale is told mostly in dialogue) doesn't add up to much in terms of character development, but the lengthy novel is good-natured and zooms along, fueled by zany Minnesota energy. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club selection; 8-city author tour. (Sept.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Off-kilter characters with grit and humor populate this

Customer Reviews

Really, really, really good read
Lorna Landvik won legions of devoted readers with her debut novel, PATTY JANE'S HOUSE OF CURL, and kept them with YOUR OASIS ON FLAME LAKE. She's likely to delight her fans again with THE TALL PINE POLKA, which has more than a few things in common with her earlier novels: Landvik returns to her beloved small-town Minnesota setting, the action centers on a friendly gathering place (where the title 'dance' routinely takes place), and the story is about the bittersweet bonds between women. A novel divided in tone, it's light-hearted and funny throughout the first half, tragic and more darkly humorous in the second part, like a sunny day at the lake turning ominous as thunderheads move in over placid waters. That a relationship like Lee and Fenny's can survive such a string of betrayals may seem overly optimistic, but friendship and love can run as deep as a feud in the forced proximity inherent in small-town life. The offbeat characters who people the rest of Tall Pine provide a comforting cushion for Fenny and Lee to fall back on; that may be the greatest small-town truth in Landvik's third novel. You might also enjoy Jackson McCrae's THE CHILDREN'S CORNER if you liked this book.

Amiable Cluelessness
This book contains a set of amiably quirky characters from upstate Minnesota and Hollywood. The author's insider knowledge gives the moviemaking scenes (a considerable portion of the book) a degree of verisimilitude.

If you by some chance actually like this book then I would recommend a Jon Hassler novel to you in addition. Begin with his "Staggerford". It has a similar setting, range of unusual and well-drawn characters, and even shares at least one key plot element. It would be worth your while to determine why his book has an enduring depth that Landvik's clueless novel lacks (and it's not just that as a college English professor, he possesses a sounder grasp of the language).

Great Read
I loved it and Im sure will read it again!
Being from Minnesota the title intreged me enough to ant to read the book and I was Not Disappointed!!!