From the Publisher
Only Rita Mae Brown, author of Rubyfruit Jungle, could have written a novel as passionately delightful as Southern Discomfort. Here is a witty, warm and pentrating tale of two decades in Montgomery Alabama--a world where all is not what it seems. Meet Hortensia Reedmuller Banastre, a beautiful woman entrenched on old money, white magnolia and a loveless marriage--until she meets an utterly gorgeous young prizefighter. Amid such memorable characters as Banana Mae Parker and Blue Rhonda Latrec (two first-class whores) and Reverend Linton Ray (who wears his clerical collar too tightly for anyone's good), Hortensia struggles to survive the hurricane of emotions caused by her scandalous love. How she ultimately triumphs is a touching and beautiful human drama--an intense and exuberant affair of the heart.
From the Inside Flap
Only Rita Mae Brown, author of Rubyfruit Jungle, could have written a novel as passionately delightful as Southern Discomfort. Here is a witty, warm and pentrating tale of two decades in Montgomery Alabama--a world where all is not what it seems. Meet Hortensia Reedmuller Banastre, a beautiful woman entrenched on old money, white magnolia and a loveless marriage--until she meets an utterly gorgeous young prizefighter. Amid such memorable characters as Banana Mae Parker and Blue Rhonda Latrec (two first-class whores) and Reverend Linton Ray (who wears his clerical collar too tightly for anyone's good), Hortensia struggles to survive the hurricane of emotions caused by her scandalous love. How she ultimately triumphs is a touching and beautiful human drama--an intense and exuberant affair of the heart.
Southern Discomfort FROM THE PUBLISHER
Only Rita Mae Brown, author of Rubyfruit Jungle, could have written a novel as passionately delightful as Southern Discomfort. Here is a witty, warm and pentrating tale of two decades in Montgomery Alabamaa world where all is not what it seems. Meet Hortensia Reedmuller Banastre, a beautiful woman entrenched on old money, white magnolia and a loveless marriageuntil she meets an utterly gorgeous young prizefighter. Amid such memorable characters as Banana Mae Parker and Blue Rhonda Latrec (two first-class whores) and Reverend Linton Ray (who wears his clerical collar too tightly for anyone's good), Hortensia struggles to survive the hurricane of emotions caused by her scandalous love. How she ultimately triumphs is a touching and beautiful human dramaan intense and exuberant affair of the heart.
FROM THE CRITICS
Annie Gottlieb
It's rare to say that a book would be better if it were longer, but I suspect that in a less impatient era ''Southern Discomfort'' would have been a 700-page epic that slowly revealed the roots of character and the intertangling of disparate lives. As it is, the book often seems abrupt and arbitrary, jump-cut as if it were a twohour movie....The plot moves in fits and starts. A fistfight between mother and son is perfectly rendered, but a later, even more crucial scene of violence is rushed and anticlimactic. The reader is left feeling charmed, moved - and a little bit cheated. -- New York Times