Fiction, World Literature, Fiction Subjects

Standing in the Rainbow

Name: Standing in the Rainbow
Author: Fannie Flagg
ISBN: 9780345452887

by Fannie Flagg

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Overview

Good news! Fannie’s back in town--and the town is among the leading characters in her new novel.

Along with Neighbor Dorothy, the lady with the smile in her voice, whose daily radio broadcasts keep us delightfully informed on all the local news, we also meet Bobby, her ten-year-old son, destined to live a thousand lives, most of them in his imagination; Norma and Macky Warren and their ninety-eight-year-old Aunt Elner; the oddly sexy and charismatic Hamm Sparks, who starts off in life as a tractor salesman and ends up selling himself to the whole state and almost the entire country; and the two women who love him as differently as night and day. Then there is Tot Whooten, the beautician whose luck is as bad as her hairdressing skills; Beatrice Woods, the Little Blind Songbird; Cecil Figgs, the Funeral King; and the fabulous Minnie Oatman, lead vocalist of the Oatman Family Gospel Singers.

The time is 1946 until the present. The town is Elmwood Springs, Missouri, right in the middle of the country, in the midst of the mostly joyous transition from war to peace, aiming toward a dizzyingly bright future.

Once again, Fannie Flagg gives us a story of richly human characters, the saving graces of the once-maligned middle classes and small-town life, and the daily contest between laughter and tears. Fannie truly writes from the heartland, and her storytelling is, to quote Time, "utterly irresistible."

From the Hardcover edition.

Synopsis

Along with Neighbor Dorothy, the lady with the smile in her voice, whose daily radio broadcasts keep us delightfully informed on all the local news, we also meet Bobby, her ten-year-old son, destined to live a thousand lives, most of them in his imagination; Norma and Macky Warren and their ninety-eight-year-old Aunt Elner; the oddly sexy and charismatic Hamm Sparks and the two women who love him as differently as night and day. Then there is Tot Whooten; Beatrice Woods, the Little Blind Songbird; Cecil Figgs, the Funeral King; and the fabulous Minnie Oatman. The time is 1946 until the present. The town is Elmwood Springs, Missouri, right in the middle of the country, in the midst of the mostly joyous transition from war to peace, aiming toward a dizzyingly bright future.

Book Magazine

In small-town Elmwood Springs, Missouri, on the heels of World War II, life holds promise for little boys like Bobby Smith. America is a nation of "Coca-Cola, chocolate- covered peanuts, jukeboxes, Oxydol, Ivory Snow, oleomargarine, and the Atomic Bomb" and is "bigger, better, richer, and stronger" than anyplace else. Bobby's dad is the town's pharmacist, and his mom hosts the state's most popular morning radio program from the family's living room. This ambitious effort from the author of Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe spans fifty years fraught with scandal and romance. The Smiths and their friends and neighbors display a kind of big-hearted optimism that has the potential to reduce their story to sentimental mush. Flagg's knack for humor and observation lend the characters a depth that rescues what might otherwise have been a typical, dramatic saga. For all its myriad twists and turns, this tale never takes an easy way out.

About the Author, Fannie Flagg

From plowing into a bank drive-thru for Candid Camera to getting an Oscar nomination for the screenplay of her second novel, Fannie Flagg's road to stardom has been a smidge unconventional. But, as the critics note, she serves up the literary equivalent of "big, juicy Middle American pie" in such novels as Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café and Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!

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Editorials

From Barnes & Noble

Fans of Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! will rejoice that Fannie Flagg returns to Elmwood Springs, Missouri, for this character-rich novel. When a group of very spirited white gospel singers arrive in town, local citizens begin to buzz. Gentle satire; good spirits; and a generous batch of surprises.

Anneli Rufus

Publishers Weekly

From the talented storyteller whose Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe became a beloved bestseller and a successful film comes a sprawling, feel-good novel with an old-fashioned beginning, middle and end. The predominant setting is tiny Elmwood Springs, Mo., and the protagonist is 10-year-old Bobby Smith, an earnest Cub Scout also capable of sneaking earthworms into his big sister's bed. His father is the town pharmacist and his mother is local radio personality Neighbor Dorothy (whom readers will recognize from Flagg's Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!). In 1946, Harry Truman presides over a victorious nation anticipating a happy and prosperous future. During the next several decades, the plot expands to include numerous beguiling characters who interact with the Smith family among them, the Oatman Family Southern Gospel Singers, led by matriarch Minnie, who survive misadventures galore to find fame after an appearance on the Arthur Godfrey show in 1949, the same year Bobby's self-esteem soars when he wins the annual town bubble gum contest. Also on hand are tractor salesman Ham Sparks, who becomes amazingly successful in politics, despite his marriage to overwhelmingly shy Betty Raye Oatman, and well-liked mortician Cecil Figgs, a sponsor of Neighbor Dorothy, who, as a bachelor in the mid-century South, also enjoys a secret life. The effects of changing social mores are handled deftly; historical events as they impact little Elmwood Springs are duly noted, and everything is infused with the good humor and joie de vivre that are Flagg's stock-in-trade. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Kirkus Reviews

Welcome to Elmwood, Missouri, 1946-2000 . . . And meet Neighbor Dorothy (she of Welcome to the World, Baby Girl!, 1998), the motherly host of a radio chat-show broadcast throughout the rural Midwest and South from her Elmwood backyard, just one of a host of deftly drawn local eccentrics. Although she doesn't think that there's anything particularly odd about her family and friends-it's more that odd things have a way of happening to them. For instance, the Oatman Family Southern Gospel Singers, who travel with Chester, a Scripture-quoting ventriloquist's dummy, just decided to drop their tongue-tied daughter Betty Raye at Dorothy's house. Betty Raye doesn't say much, but she's a quick study. And there's Dorothy's ten-year-old son Bobby, who daydreams about being the unrecognized son of Dale Evans and Roy Rogers, when not sneaking off to take a blind singer on his mother's radio show to thrill rides at the carnival. And poor Tot, whose senile mother steals the Christmas presents and hides them in the backyard. Tot wanders through the story like the lost member of an ancient Greek chorus (if ancient Greek chorus members wore chenille bathrobes). She has more than her mother to contend with: husband Dwayne Sr. is a drunk, and feckless son Dwayne Jr. is no use to anyone. Terminally gracious Ida, who believes that only the heathen eat without a tablecloth, clucks and fusses. Then there's Hamm Sparks, a young tractor-salesman with the natural affability of a born politician. He surprises everyone by marrying Betty Raye, and one fine day she surprises them even more by becoming governor of Missouri. As the decades unfold, each character flowers in unexpected ways-and wonder of wonders, Hammexperiences a truly southern apotheosis and gets to heaven in a fishing boat. Hilarious, charming, authentic-a winner all the way.