Fannie Flagg

Sookie Poole of Point Clear, Alabama, has just married off the last of her three daughters and is looking forward to relaxing and perhaps travelling with her husband, Earle. Then one day, Sookie discovers a secret about her mother's past that calls into question everything she ever thought she knew about herself, her family, and her future.

Life is the strangest thing. One minute, Mrs Elner Shimfissle is up a tree, picking figs to make jam, and the next thing she knows, she is off on a strange adventure, running into people she never expected to see again, in the unlikeliest of places.

We embark on a journey to the Gulf Coast's Shell Beach, the South that only Southerners know, and into the life of Daisy Fay Harper. Daisy is a sassy, truth-telling heroine who just can't stay out of trouble. What's more, she tells us everything.

Though her friends think Maggie has the perfect life, she's actually perfectly miserable. But just when Maggie begins to wonder if there's much point in going on, her life takes a wild turn, and she finds herself catapulted into one surprising discovery after the next.

Oswald Campbell from Chicago is given only months to live unless he moves South. He finds himself in Lost River, Alabama where the residents are friendly but eccentric. A collection of misfits, fixers and ordinary good-hearted folk are heading for a magical Christmastide.

Elmwood Springs, Missouri. World War II has ended. Neighbour Dorothy broadcasts daily from her front room - to an audience across the state - the antics of her wayward son Bobby and adolescent Anna Lee. It's hard to keep secrets in a community like theirs, but life isn't perfect, and even Neighbour Dorothy has a tragedy as well hidden as it can be.

Elmwood Springs, Missouri, is a small town like any other, but something strange is happening at the cemetery. Still Meadows, as it's called, is anything but still. Odd things are occuring, and it starts the whole town talking...