Redheaded Reviews: The Whole Town's Talking by Fannie Flagg

In the 1870s Lordor Nordstrom left Sweden for America and sought good land to build a dairy farm on and he found it in Missouri. When he had settled he put out ads in Swedish American newspapers for others to come and settle the area around him and they did along with two Germans and a Norweigan and by 1880 they had built a settlement they called Swede Town. He set aside land for a cemetery in 1889 called Still Meadows and every originating family would get plots for free.

Lordor had gone to other Swede Towns close by but had not seen a woman to marry. So someone suggested he do a mail order bride and advertise in the paper for one. So he did. Katrina lived in Chicago and worked as a servant in a large household. When she saw the ad she was curious and responded and sent back a picture of herself. Lordor sent her a picture of himself and that must have been enough because she agreed to marry him. The two would fall in love and have two children, neither of whom had an interest in running the farm. But the neighbor's son was very much interested in the cow business and Lordor took Andor under his wing and taught him everything he knew and then when he got too old to run the farm anymore he sold him the farm for a reasonable price with his promise that it would stay in the Nordstrom family (Andor married Katrina's niece Beatrice).

Andor and Beatrice tried very hard to have a child and had a couple of miscarriages until when they were thirty-six years old and they had Hanna Marie who sadly turned out to be deaf. They had her home taught sign language and reading and writing until she was old enough to go to college and then they sent her off to college in Boston. When she graduated she came home with a young man named Michael who was a little slick for Andor's tastes. But Andor promised his wife he wouldn't look him up, which was a shame as he wasn't what he seemed and Hanna Marie marries him and her life doesn't go so well after that.

This book is filled with a cast of characters. I've only shown you a few. Beatrice's sister, Elner is another one and she is a hoot. Everyone loves Elner. She collects animals and meets the most unusual people out on her farm. Also, Lordor is the first person to die and go to Still Meadows but not too much later his wife joins him and the two talk to each other out there. And as others join them the dead are talking up a storm at the cemetery while the living is talking all around town. It's an interesting way to do a book. In order for the dead to find out what's been going on is for someone to die and let them know or for someone to tell them at the gravesite, which rarely happens. This book will make you angry and feel like throwing it against a wall. You'll get so attached to the characters. And want to kill some of them. Flagg has done it again. I give this book five out of five stars.

Quotes

Oh, I don’t know, Beatrice. Momma said having babies is awful painful. I think I’d just as soon have a litter of kittens myself.

-Fannie Flagg (The Whole Town’s Talking p 147)

She knew exactly where her behavior came from and how silly it was, bur, on the other hand, if she didn’t clean those blinds, who would? She wasn’t drinking or taking drugs or robbing banks; she just had a thing for Clorox.

-Fannie Flagg (The Whole Town Is Talking p 346)

“Mrs. Bell, at what age did you begin to feel old?” “Well, the last time they took my picture for my driver’s license, it nearly scared me to death. ‘Mercy’, I thought. ‘When did my eyes get so squinty and all those chins show up?’ It’s best not to have your picture made or hear your voice on a tape machine. It can really depress you. I thought I was still cute, but I was wrong. I was an old lady with an old lady’s voice. It sure wrecked my high opinion of myself.”

-Fannie Flagg (The Whole Town Is Talking p 401)

Although they really liked her, most people thought Tot was tough and bitter. Ans she could say some pretty cruel things. But bless her heart, the truth was that all along, she had been hopelessly in love with a man who wasn’t there. Unrequited love will turn even the sweetest people bitter.

-Fannie Flagg (The Whole Town Is Talking p 453)