“A hilarious, endearing novel.”—Los Angeles Times
In Fannie Flagg’s high-spirited first novel, we meet Daisy Fay Harper in the spring of 1952, where she’s “not doing much except sitting around waiting for the sixth grade.” When she leaves Shell Beach, Mississippi, in September 1959, she is packed up and ready for the Miss America Pageant, vowing “I won’t come back until I’m...

Born into poverty in a small desert town in the American Midwest, Thea Kronborg is one of seven children. But Thea is exceptional, a fact recognized by a discerning few, including Ray Kennedy, who longs to marry her but whose fate it is to set her free. With her rugged will and pioneer spirit, Thea carves her way from Moonstone, Colorado to Chicago, from Dresden to New York, culminating in a triumphant debut at the Metropolitan Opera. Thea has become...

Thirteen-year-old Rob Peck is left to take charge of his mother, aunt, a few animals on a hardscrabble five-acre Vermont farm.

Financial journalist Rebecca Bloomwood seeks solace from the boredom and pressures in life with her shopping, a solution that brings her close to financial disaster, until she encounters a story that will change her life.