Product Description

The remarkable novel of two Southern friendships--the basis of the hit film--available for the first time in large print.


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #334545 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-05
• Released on: 2005-04-05
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 9.64" h x 1.12" w x 6.40" l, 1.50 pounds
• Binding: Hardcover
• 416 pages

From Publishers Weekly
When Cleo Threadgood and Evelyn Couch meet in the visitors lounge of an Alabama nursing home, they find themselves exchanging the sort of confidences that are sometimes only safe to reveal to strangers. At 48, Evelyn is falling apart: none of the middle-class values she grew up with seem to signify in today's world. On the other hand, 86-year-old Cleo is still being nurtured by memories of a lifetime spent in Whistle Stop, a pocket-sized town outside of Birmingham, which flourished in the days of the Great Depression. Most of the town's life centered around its one cafe, whose owners, gentle Ruth and tomboyish Idgie, served up grits (both true and hominy) to anyone who passed by. How their love for each other and just about everyone else survived visits from the sheriff, the Ku Klux Klan, a host of hungry hoboes, a murder and the rigors of the Depression makes lively readingthe kind that eventually nourishes Evelyn and the reader as well. Though Flagg's characters tend to be sweet as candied yams or mean clear through, she manages to infuse their story with enough tartness to avoid sentimentality. Admirers of the wise child in Flagg's first novel, Coming Attractions, will find her grown-up successor, Idgie, equally appealing. The book's best character, perhaps, is the town of Whistle Stop itself. Too bad the trains don't stop there anymore.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"The people in Miss Flagg's book are as real as the people in books can
be. If you put an ear to the pages, you can almost hear the characters
speak. The writer's imaginative skill transforms simple, everyday events
into complex happenings that take on universal meanings."

--Chattanooga Times

"This whole literary enterprise shines with honesty, gallantry, and love
of perfect details that might otherwise be forgotten."

--Los Angeles Times

"A sparkling gem."

--Birmingham News

"Watch out for Fannie Flagg. When I walked into the Whistle Stop Cafe she
fractured my funny bone, drained my tear ducts, and stole my heart."

--Florence King, Author of Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady


"Admirers of the wise child in Flagg's first novel, Coming Attractions,
will find her grown-up successor, Idgie, equally appealing. The book's
best character, perhaps, is the town of Whistle Stop itself--too bad
trains don't stop there anymore."

--Publisher's Weekly


From the Trade Paperback edition.

Ingram
A southern-fried, funny, and endearing tale that weaves between the Whistle Stop Cafe of the 1930s and the Rose Terrace Nursing Home of the 1980s. 2 cassettes.