Standing in the Rainbow by Fannie Flagg (probably the best book I ever read. Excellent descriptions and dialogues about ordinary, but wonderful people in the midwest. You will want to be just like these people. The main character is a woman, who in the 1930’s becomes a kind of a pioneer for people like Heloise (doling out household and farm tips and delivering the news about marriages and births and church socials) after they parked a radio tower in her back yard.
Alice’s Tulips or The Persian Pickle Club by Sandra Dallas (they’re both stories about women, one set in the 1850’s civil war era and the other one set in the 1940’s. Both involve wonderful descriptions about women quilting and stitching and both have a mystery. Excellent regional dialogue.)
The Lumby lines by Gail Fraser. The first in a series of books about some nice people that live in the little town of Lumby and all of the quirky people who inhabit the town. A couple from a cosmopolitan city move to Lumby to purchase and restore an old burned out Abbey with the help of the monks who used to live there. The couple in turn, helps the monks start up a business making and selling their own fruit juice sauces from the trees on the couple’s property. After you read the first book, you’ll want to read the rest in the series, but the first book stands on it’s own.
The Hot Flash Club by Nancy Thayer. Don’t be put off by the title (my mother gave me this book before I even turned 40 and I’m so glad she did) It’s about a group of 4 women who accidentally become friends through a chance meeting, then start regularly meeting at a Nantucket seafood restaurant to talk about their lives, their families, their hopes and dreams and fears. These are not sit around women, they lead very active and interesting lives and they will draw you into their circle. This is the first book in a series. You will want to read the others too, but this book is good for a stand alone.
The Help by Kathryn Stockett. This is a book set in the south during the early 1960’s the main characters are a group of black maids and the book, through separate dialogues, shows and tells what it was like during this time period. The dialogue is perfect, you can actually hear these ladies speaking. Some of it it sad, lots of it is funny and all of it is poignant. You will read about loving relationships between the maids and their families and each other. And you will also read about the shameful and sometimes abusive relationships that existed between husbands and wives and un-enlightened rich white people towards poor blacks. You will also read about loving and respectful relationships, although distant, between the maids and some of their employers, especially the children (who have now become adults) that they raised.
Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind by Ann B. Ross. This is the first book in a series about an older, well to do woman in a highly Presbeterian area of the south who has recently lost her husband. She has also found out a series of hilarious, but shocking secrets about her recently deceased husband. Although Miss Julia is an upright citizen of her town, she also has a mind of her own and is constantly having to deal with friends and neighbors and potential (but unsuitable) suitors who are always trying to tell her what to do. Turns out that Miss Julia is going to tell more than a few people what’s what. She also enters into a very uncommon living arrangement with a woman and her young son. Miss Julia also had a straight shooting maid who helps her sort it all out and keep her grounded. And all the while she is falling in love, but trying to resist a wonderful handsome widower. This story has all sorts of delicious twists and turns, and excellent Southern dialogue. Again, you will want to read all of the books in this series, but this book can be used as a stand alone.
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