Tag: Historical Novels

The Wonder Boy of Whistle Stop

BonnieReadsAndWrites3 Comments
The Sequel to Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Since I reviewed this book for Historical Novels Review, I could not post the review until now. It was actually published last year. This is a treat for Fannie Flagg fans who always wondered what happened to the characters from Whistle Stop!

REVIEW

The Wonder Boy of Whistle Stop is the sequel to Fannie Flagg’s novel Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe. It is a delightful novel that jumps back and forth in different time periods between the 1930s and present day, and tells us the further adventures of Buddy Threadgoode Jr. and others. This book is not a standalone. Readers will greatly benefit from reading the first book, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe.

This was a joy to read. It takes us back to the 1930s when Ruth Jamison and Idgie Threadgoode were running their cafe in Whistle Stop, Alabama. It shows the present day where Bud Threadgoode is an old man, and his daughter Ruthie has grown children. And it tells us tales of a younger Bud in different periods of his life. All the popular characters from the first book make an appearance. I especially enjoyed the role of Evelyn Couch in this story. As in the first book, news reports from Dot Weems pop up in between chapters, from all different time periods. It is a story of family, friends, love, and loss, and the weaving together of the time periods shows how friends and family never really leave us.

I truly feel that Fannie Flagg wrote this book for her fans, those of us who have read all of her books, as a way of tying everything together. She catches us up on all the popular characters from Fried Green Tomatoes, and I may have shrieked in delight when a character from Flagg’s other best selling series, the Elmwood Springs books, shows up in Whistle Stop!

Every little nugget and every piece of news about a beloved character felt like a gift from Fannie Flagg to her readers.

I received a free copy of this book from Random House via Historical Novels Review Magazine. My opinions are my own.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Fannie Flagg

Fannie Flagg’s career started in the fifth grade when she wrote, directed, and starred in her first play, titled The Whoopee Girls, and she has not stopped since. At age nineteen she began writing and producing television specials, and later wrote for and appeared on Candid Camera. She then went on to distinguish herself as an actress and a writer in television, films, and the theater. She is the bestselling author of Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man; Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe; Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!; Standing in the Rainbow; A Redbird Christmas; Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven; I Still Dream About You; The All-Girl Filling Station’s Last Reunion; and The Whole Town’s Talking. Flagg’s script for the movie Fried Green Tomatoes was nominated for an Academy Award and the Writers Guild of America Award and won the highly regarded Scripter Award for best screenplay of the year. Fannie Flagg is the winner of the Harper Lee Prize. She lives happily in California and Alabama.

BUY THE WONDER BOY OF WHISTLE STOP ON AMAZON

FANNIE FLAGG’S FACEBOOK PAGE

Sunday Reflections

BonnieReadsAndWrites7 Comments

BOOKS READ THIS WEEK FOR THE HISTORICAL NOVEL SOCIETY

I am currently reviewing several books for Historical Novels Review Magazine. This is the magazine of the Historical Novel Society. I am including the cover and the book description from Amazon. My reviews will not be posted until after the magazine comes out in February 2021. The books I have read/am reading for them this week are:

Twelve-year-old Adam is whisked away from his imperfect but quiet life with the arrival of a stranger and a magical promise in this time travel mystery.

Amazon Description: It’s 1999 and Adam doesn’t mind living at his uncle’s bakery, the Biscuit Basket, on the Lower East Side in New York City. The warm, delicious smells of freshly baked breads and chocolate croissants make every day feel cozy, even if Adam doesn’t have many friends and misses his long dead parents very much.

When a mysterious but cheerful customer shows Adam a snow globe and says that adventures await him, it’s too strange to be true. But days later, an unbelievable, incredible thing happens. Adam finds a similar looking snow globe and immediately travels back in time, first to Times Square in 1935, then a candle factory fire in 1967. 

But how are these moments related? What do they have to do with his parents’ death? And why is a tall man with long eyebrows and a thin mustache following Adam’s every move?

Book 9 in the Carpenter & Quincannon mystery series. It is the late 1800’s, and Sabina Carpenter and John Quincannon are partners, both as detectives and in life.

Amazon Description: Quincannon’s pursuit of two con men who have absconded to Hawaii with a considerable sum of his employer’s assets dovetails nicely with Sabina’s vision of a second honeymoon.

But neither is wont to stay out of trouble, and Sabina inadvertently becomes involved in a locked room/dying message murder in Honolulu.

Amazon Description: April 1944, the fifty-fifth month of the war in Europe. The entire island of Britain fairly buzzes with the coiled energy of a million men poised to leap the Channel to France, the first, riskiest step in the Allies’ long slog to the heart of Germany and the end of the war.

Lieutenant Eddie Harkins is tasked to investigate the murder of Helen Batcheller, an OSS analyst. Harkins is assigned a British driver, Private Pamela Lowell, to aid in his investigation. Lowell is smart, brave and resourceful; like Harkins, she is prone to speak her mind even when it doesn’t help her.

Soon a suspect is arrested and Harkins is ordered to stop digging. Suspicious, he continues his investigation only to find himself trapped in a web of Soviet secrets. As bombs fall, Harkins must solve the murder and reveal the spies before it is too late.

Amazon Description: Headstrong Johanna Berglund, a linguistics student at the University of Minnesota, has very definite plans for her future . . . plans that do not include returning to her hometown and the secrets and heartaches she left behind there. But the US Army wants her to work as a translator at a nearby camp for German POWs.

Johanna arrives to find the once-sleepy town exploding with hostility. Most patriotic citizens want nothing to do with German soldiers laboring in their fields, and they’re not afraid to criticize those who work at the camp as well. When Johanna describes the trouble to her friend Peter Ito, a language instructor at a school for military intelligence officers, he encourages her to give the town that rejected her a second chance.

The Historical Novel Society provides a quarterly magazine, Historical Novels Review, with reviews of many different genres of historical fiction. The reviews are both online and in the hard copy magazine. They also provide interesting online articles and hold conferences and other events. My reviews for them which appeared in the November 2020 issue can be found here

Set The Stars Alight

BonnieReadsAndWrites2 Comments

Set the Stars Alight is a beautiful, intricately woven story of friendship. In London in 2000, Lucy and Dash meet as children and grow up together, listening to the spellbinding stories of Lucy’s father, a watchmaker. Some of the stories are make believe, and some are based in truth. Lucy has long researched one of the tales, about the lost ship Jubilee, and she is determined to find out if this fable is real. Many years later, Dash joins her in her search for the legendary vessel.

In 1805, Frederick Hanford and Elias Flint, bitter enemies, bond over shared circumstances. Frederick, the son of a cruel and calculating admiral, comes to see Elias, a shepherd, as his only true family. Mistakes, betrayal, and sacrifice put Frederick’s life and reputation in peril. Will he gain redemption?

This captivating and inspirational book is about the kind of friendship that time and distance, and even betrayal, can never destroy. The past and present are beautifully spun together in a story of love, secrets, and sacrifice. The magical writing of Amanda Dykes will keep you as spellbound as were Lucy and Dash, sitting at the watchmaker’s knee.

I received a free copy of this book from Bethany House via the Historical Novels Review Magazine. This is an Editor’s Choice review in the magazine. My opinions are my own.

Link to the book on Amazon

Link to Amanda Dykes’ Amazon page

Link to My Review on Goodreads (Like and Follow if you are so inclined)

Link to The Historical Novel Society

Link to my reviews on The Historical Novel Society website