{"title":"Patty Friedmann","description":"Patty Friedmann has written five previous novels, including Eleanor Rushing, Secondhand Smoke, and Odds. Except for slight interruptions for education and natural disasters, she has always lived in New Orleans.","products":[{"product_id":"eleanor-rushing-paperback","title":"Eleanor Rushing - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003eEleanor Rushing knows Maxim Walters loves her. At the crowded city council meeting, he chooses to sit beside her; from his pulpit, he preaches only to her, a vision in white sitting in the first pew. Soon, he invites her along on a business trip to Nashville, where they make love all night long. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBut Maxim sees things a little differently. The distinguished and very married preacher denies his love for Eleanor, but she understands his reluctance to walk away from the plain wife and the narrow path of virtue he chose long ago. Refusing to be refused, Eleanor showers Maxim with gifts and volunteers at the church simply to be near him. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThough she appears to be undaunted, Eleanor is, in fact, deeply troubled. Sparing no detail, she recounts the tragedy that left her mute for four years, and the abuse she has suffered at the hands of her friends and family. Though these memoirs are often at odds with those of others around her, the now-loquacious Eleanor charms us completely until we can't help but become her willing and faithful supporters. In this narrative tour-de-force-- at once hilarious and deeply moving--Friedmann gives a memorable look at the willfulness of obsessive love, the caustic mix of money and leisure, and the power of memory to damage the soul.","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":68220404400351,"sku":"9781582430775","price":16.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/f0ygLbQd1B9781582430775.webp?v=1792579899"},{"product_id":"where-do-they-all-come-from-paperback","title":"Where Do They All Come From? - Paperback","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"Many of Friedmann's stories contain an admixture of quirkiness, with elements of dark humor. Most of the stories contain startling surprise endings that this reviewer hesitates to explain, lest the surprise be ruined. These stories are truly enjoyable-New Orleans Review of Books\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOver the course of her novel-writing career, New Orleans writer Patty Friedmann also has written short stories that resonate with her darkly comic voice. This collection offers the best-some old, some new, some before Katrina, a few written after she unscrambled her mind from not evacuating for the storm.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat the reader finds here are the New Orleans characters only locals recognize. Patty doesn't venture much into the French Quarter; she doesn't do public drunkenness; she certainly never secondlines. Instead she shares what might be her most memorable character, Jerusha Bailey, a mean old white woman who loses her husband's ashes in a McDonald's parking lot. And Darby, the smart girl who lives in a New Orleans gingerbread house but is tormented by her dumb brick-house-dwelling private school classmates-with tragic consequences.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Patty takes us back to the time when Mr. Bingle was hoisted every Christmas onto the front of Maison Blanche on Canal Street in New Orleans. But she also brings young cynics into the flooded city after the storm. We meet lonely men and controlling women, yet we smile crookedly.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Patty Friedmann's bio says she has lived all her life in New Orleans \"except for education and natural disasters,\" and it shows. Walker Percy once said, \"I make bold to predict that the next Southern literary revival will be led by a Jewish mother,\" and he went on to describe her as \"a shrewd self-possessed woman with a sharp eye.\" It has been said that this is Patty Friedmann. The reader can see it here.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BooksCloud","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":68360644853983,"sku":"9780991374588","price":26.93,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0813\/8958\/4607\/files\/ZACbjl28r69780991374588.webp?v=1793598705"}],"url":"https:\/\/blackandbarhe.com\/collections\/patty-friedmann.oembed","provider":"Black \u0026 Barhe Bookstore","version":"1.0","type":"link"}