Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Book excerpt: Folksy and fresh, endearing and affecting, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe is a now-classic novel about two women: Evelyn, who’s in the sad slump of middle age, and gray-headed Mrs. Threadgoode, who’s telling her life story. Her tale includes two more women—the irrepressibly daredevilish tomboy Idgie and her friend Ruth—who back in the thirties ran a little place in Whistle Stop, Alabama, offering good coffee, southern barbecue, and all kinds of love and laughter—even an occasional murder. And as the past unfolds, the present will never be quite the same again. Praise for Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe “A real novel and a good one [from] the busy brain of a born storyteller.”—The New York Times “Happily for us, Fannie Flagg has preserved [the Threadgoodes] in a richly comic, poignant narrative that records the exuberance of their lives, the sadness of their departure.”—Harper Lee “This whole literary enterprise shines with honesty, gallantry, and love of perfect details that might otherwise be forgotten.”—Los Angeles Times “Funny and macabre.”—The Washington Post “Courageous and wise.”—Houston Chronicle