The perfect next course in the New York Times –bestselling series--plus dozens of recipes from Abbotsville’s best cooks. Don't miss Miss Julia Raises the Roof , coming April 2018 from Viking. Autumn’s crisp bite is in the air, but Miss Julia soon discovers that, alas, leaves aren’t the only things falling. James, Hazel Marie’s housekeeper, has taken a nasty tumble down some stairs. How can Hazel Marie feed and take care of him--not to mention a husband, son, and twin baby girls--when she barely knows how to boil water? Miss Julia promptly organizes the ladies of Abbotsville to give Hazel Marie cooking lessons. But before she can relax, Hazel Marie’s shady preacher-uncle turns up--just as Miss Julia learns that James has roped young Lloyd into an Internet scam! Filled with mayhem, delicious recipes, and plenty of steel-magnolia-style action, Miss Julia Stirs Up Trouble is a feast from cover to cover.

**Praise for Ann B. Ross and the Miss Julia series:

“A charming, fun adventure with new relatives, old secrets and a will putting Miss Julia and the Abbotsville regulars in a true Southern mess. I loved it!” —Duffy Brown, bestselling author of the Consignment Shop Mysteries**

"Ann B. Ross develops characters so expertly, through quirks, names, and mannerisms, that they easily feel familiar as the reader is gently immersed into the world Miss Ross has created. . . . A delightful read." —Winston-Salem Journal

"Miss Julia is one of the most delightful characters to come along in years. Ann B. Ross has created what is sure to become a classic Southern comic novel. Hooray for Miss Julia, I could not have liked it more." —Fannie Flagg, author of The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion 

"Yes, Miss Julia is back, and I, for one, am one happy camper." —J. A. Jance, author of Cold Betrayal 

Autorentext

Ann B. Ross

Klappentext

The perfect next course in the New York Times-bestselling series-plus dozens of recipes from Abbotsville's best cooks. Don't miss Miss Julia Raises the Roof, coming April 2018 from Viking. Autumn's crisp bite is in the air, but Miss Julia soon discovers that, alas, leaves aren't the only things falling. James, Hazel Marie's housekeeper, has taken a nasty tumble down some stairs. How can Hazel Marie feed and take care of him-not to mention a husband, son, and twin baby girls-when she barely knows how to boil water? Miss Julia promptly organizes the ladies of Abbotsville to give Hazel Marie cooking lessons. But before she can relax, Hazel Marie's shady preacher-uncle turns up-just as Miss Julia learns that James has roped young Lloyd into an Internet scam!

Filled with mayhem, delicious recipes, and plenty of steel-magnolia-style action, Miss Julia Stirs Up Trouble is a feast from cover to cover.

Zusammenfassung
The perfect next course in the New York Times–bestselling series—plus dozens of recipes from Abbotsville’s best cooks. Don't miss *Miss Julia Raises the Roof*, coming April 2018 from Viking.  

Autumn’s crisp bite is in the air, but Miss Julia soon discovers that, alas, leaves aren’t the only things falling. James, Hazel Marie’s housekeeper, has taken a nasty tumble down some stairs. How can Hazel Marie feed and take care of him—not to mention a husband, son, and twin baby girls—when she barely knows how to boil water? Miss Julia promptly organizes the ladies of Abbotsville to give Hazel Marie cooking lessons. But before she can relax, Hazel Marie’s shady preacher-uncle turns up—just as Miss Julia learns that James has roped young Lloyd into an Internet scam!

Filled with mayhem, delicious recipes, and plenty of steel-magnolia-style action, Miss Julia Stirs Up Trouble is a feast from cover to cover.

Leseprobe
Chapter 1

Stepping carefully onto the newly sodded patches of grass at the side of the house, I stood by a hydrangea bush for a few minutes, admiring the graceful lines of my new Williamsburg chimney. Reassured that it was worth what it had cost to have it, I strolled across the lawn to the arbor near the back fence. After brushing dried leaves from the bench, I sat down to revel in the glorious October day. I marveled at the clear, blue sky—Carolina blue, as Lloyd called it—and the molten gold leaves of the gingko tree on the edge of Mildred’s lawn next door. A light breeze ruffled through the almost leafless wisteria vine overhead, as a feeling of peace and gratitude for our blessings filled my soul. All the carpenters, painters, paperhangers, plumbers, and brick masons were long gone, leaving us with a remodeled and redecorated house. Well, not the whole house, but three rooms had been remodeled and redecorated. Even better, extra furnishings, like the bedroom rug, which had been rolled into a stumbling block in the hall, were out of the house and the mattress was off the dining room table and back on our bed where it belonged. My house had been returned to its ordered self, and at least for these few minutes, all seemed right with the world.

Sam, my darling husband—acquired late in life, but all the more precious because of it—was home from his travels, working now in his new office in the old sunroom upstairs and loving it. “The best and most efficient office I’ve ever had, Julia,” he’d told me, but I think that was because I’d had the foresight to put in the semblance of a tiny kitchen in a closet—a coffeepot and an under-the-counter refrigerator so he didn’t have to tromp downstairs every time he wanted something to drink. The hall bathroom was right next door, too.

And Lloyd. My heart lifted as I thought of the boy foisted on me by my deceased first husband by way of a long- term adulterous situation, the boy who had become the center of my life. In spite of the fact that his mother was now well and truly married to Mr. Pickens—an event I’d almost despaired of ever happening— Lloyd didn’t seem eager to leave my house for theirs. He was still in and out, spending the school week with Sam and me and most weekends with his mother and Mr. Pickens four blocks away in Sam’s old house. I worried a little that the odd arrangement would warp his character but, on the other hand, having two homes with two helpings of being loved and wanted couldn’t be harmful. Both apprehensive and excited, he’d started his first year of high school and now, after a couple of months, he was finding that a quick intelligence and a sunny disposition were making a place for him. I couldn’t help but notice that he was still smaller and, in spite of his usual serious demeanor, younger-seeming than his classmates, many of whom were on the verge of manhood with their husky physiques and voices. And, actually, he was younger, for Hazel Marie had let him skip a grade before they came to live with me. Yet I had no worries about Lloyd fitting in. He was making new friends and meeting the new challenges set by his teachers. He was the joy of my life and, as I thought of him, I knew that at least for this moment in time, all was right with him and with the world.

Hazel Marie had her challenges as well, and to my constant amazement, considering the fact that she’d had such a disreputable background to overcome, she was meeting them head on. Who would have ever thought that the overpainted woman who’d flounced up to my door, bastard son by her side, announcing to me and the world what Wesley Lloyd Springer had been doing before he passed over, would turn out to be a sweet and valued friend, as well as an accepted member of Abbotsville society, such as it was?

Those twin baby girls—born, I am happy …