Reviews with content warning for Physical abuse - Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

I absentmindedly snagged this at the bookstore to carry with me on a road trip thinking nothing of it, but this definitely rose to the top!

It has a beautiful balance of humor and heartbreak and all of the characters are so incredibly diverse with their own unique flaws and personalities that makes them feel real. As someone born and raised in the south, this book really did feel like home and it made me miss not only the sense of community, but my grandmother's fried grits patties that her mom used to make during the Great Depression. Fannie Flagg's effortless imagery and seamless chronology is something to revel in, and I truly enjoyed the Weems Weekly as a nice "buffer" between the four varying perspectives. The way Fannie Flagg made each perspective have their own individual "voice" just sucked me into the story even more, and I found myself rooting for all of the different characters. I adored Ninny's rambling and eccentric nature, Evelyn's struggles through her midlife crisis, Sipsey's no nonsense kindness, Smokey's somber life, Eva's independence, and Idgie and Ruth's wholehearted devotion to one another.

This book doesn't stray from the hard truths of southern history, but it also highlighted the individual efforts to get through tough times and how a community banded together in hopes of transforming the Whistlestop Cafe into a haven for all. The language is hard to read and, at times a lot of the topics included are uncomfortable to witness, but as someone who's parents, grandparents, and so on and so forth were raised in a town similar depicted to this one, it's eerily accurate

- from the normalized age gaps in relationships (specifically Idgie and Ruth's comes to mind), depictions of domestic violence between Ruth and her husband, prostitution and it's stigmatization, how the different skin colors of Artis and Jasper shaped how people treated them and thus their futures, normalized microaggressions, train accidents (from the outside looking in, seems way left field but my grandmother's town has a strip that, to this day, is called "the death loop"), casual racist vernacular in conversation, the "white savior" mentality of the Threadgoodes, Judeo-Christian undertones, even down to the tradition of stopping the clocks and covering the mirrors in death to "let the spirit go" and not be trapped in the land of the living.

However, it's important to acknowledge these details and these various mentalities instead of watering them down any more than Flagg already had because they are very real and were prominent at this time.

In all honestly, there really is so much to unpack and I really do recommend this for anyone missing "home," looking for representation, feeling stuck in the middle of a midlife crisis, or just hoping for a good story.

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lily1304's review against another edition

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reflective slow-paced

3.25

Fried Green Tomatoes reminded me of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, in that the pace of the plot is slow, if there even is a plot. The emphasis is on the charming characters across generations, and a kind of nostalgia for the early 20th century. It's a cute little story, worth reading but not very exciting or memorable.

It's flagged as "LGBTQ+" because it prominently features a committed relationship between two women, and no one in the novel is ever weird about it. Racism and sexism are strong themes, but there is apparently zero homophobia in Whistle Stop, Alabama. It's honestly kind of refreshing, but also confusing. Everyone treats this couple like they're married, but they're described in really vague terms, almost like a "Boston marriage" romantic friendship. It's like the opposite of The Price of Salt.

The way racism is depicted is particularly interesting - the novel features the Ku Klux Klan and an old white lady with a mild discomfort around black men and everything in between. It's difficult to tell which mildly racist opinions are the author's and which are just the characters'. The N-word and the word "colored" are used with abandon. The novel also makes a big deal out of colorism among the black characters.

One of the characters, Evelyn, an older lady in 1986, goes on a whole journey about how sexism has affected her life - and her story concludes triumphantly with her at weight-loss camp, and losing a significant amount of weight is one of her victories. Unironically. Evelyn's relationship with Ninny makes it seem like the story is about to take a strong body-positive stance, but it's a total bait and switch.

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nightmareroutine's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

As a fan of the movie, I can say I enjoyed it more than this book. Both are definitely a product of their time, but the movie handled the more sensitive aspects with a bit more tact. While there are good aspects certainly (Ruth and Idgie are more explicitly an item in the book than the movie, WIN) there are also downfalls (more insight into Evelyn Couch's internal world reveal a white feminist girl boss who wants to "blow up the middle east to prevent a third world war"...yikes). Even the good characters serving as the moral beacons of the story really come off with some terrible takes at times when discussing race, which is obviously a major theme of the book. But, overall, the novel was still both funny and touching, all the cast of characters get their stories nicely wrapped up in the end, and the writing was solid.

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georgiaaa's review

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emotional funny lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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mfieldshalva's review

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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podanotherjessi's review

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funny reflective slow-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book had me laughing out loud almost from the first page. It was a sweet story, and I really enjoyed it. It was also more emotional than I expected, especially considering how predictable I found it.
My main two complaints that keep it from a higher rating were the number of characters and the seeming lack of structure to the chronology. The latter of these wasn't really too bad til the end and might have had a purpose, so that's more on me.
But the characters were definitely an issue. About a half dozen characters in this were absolutely delightful. They were well fleshed out, and I cared about them deeply. But the others were more or less interchangable. I couldn't keep up with who was who at all.

Characters: 8/10
Plot: 9/10
Setting: 10/10
General Appeal: 9/10
Style: 9/10
Originality: 8/10
Ending: 8/10

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sachikoriddle's review

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4.0

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