Monday, August 06, 2012

Books: I Still Dream About You

I Still Dream About You
By Fannie Flagg
Copyright 2010
Read by the author

The author of Fried Green Tomatoes can still spin a good southern yarn.

She offers up some quirky characters in her latest book. Maggie Fortenberry is an aging former Ms. Alabama who has decided to kill herself.

This in and of itself is not funny, and I confess it made me more than a little uncomfortable. Maggie is very organized and she had thought out her plan for a long time before she decided to put things in motion.

But she keeps getting interrupted, and she has to stall her plans again and again.

Maggie's predicament is not amusing, and frankly I had a hard time feeling bad for this woman. She was lonely but she had a fairly nice life. She wanted to die more out of vanity and fear of growing old and wrinkled than because she was depressed.

Fortunately the author led us off into other relationships to take us away from the heaviness of the topic. Her other characters - Babs the evil real estate agent, Hazel, the midget with the business acumen of Warren Buffet, and Brenda, the African American who would be mayor of Birmingham, were enough to keep me listening.

Flagg also tossed in some Birmingham history that I think probably has some truth to it, though I don't know and would have to defer to the area historians on that to be sure.

I don't think this book stands up to some of Flagg's better works, but then it is hard to beat something that was ultimately nominated for an Academy Award, like Fried Green Tomatoes.

However, this is not a bad read, and if you're interested in old southern ladies, or just want a southern read, then you might want to give this one a try.


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