'Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistlestop Cafe'

Fannie Flagg

This tale within a tale is a rollicking read of love, loss, triumph, and transformation. Unhappy housewife Evelyn Couch becomes inspired by the stories eighty-six-year-old Cleo Threadgood tells about volatile tomboy Idgie Threadgood, gentle and unhappy Ruth Jamison, and the Whistlestop Cafe with its colorful characters who drop in for buttermilk biscuits, red-eye gravy, and Big George's barbecue. The stories inspire Evelyn to transform herself into "Towanda!"