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Original Title:	Mama Makes Up Her Mind: And Other Dangers of Southern Living
ISBN:	0679751602 (ISBN13: 9780679751601)
Edition Language:	English
Setting:	Georgia(United States)

Mama Makes Up Her Mind and Other Dangers of Southern Living

Bailey White

Trade Paperback | Pages: 229 pages

Rating: 3.95 | 4185 Users | 372 Reviews

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Title	:	Mama Makes Up Her Mind and Other Dangers of Southern Living
Author	:	Bailey White
Book Format	:	Trade Paperback
Book Edition	:	Anniversary Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 229 pages
Published	:	April 12th 1994 by Vintage (first published 1993)
Categories	:	Humor. Nonfiction. Autobiography. Memoir. Short Stories. American. Southern. Writing. Essays

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Whether written (in books such as this) or spoken (in her oral essays on NPR), I love Bailey White's voice. It is honest, original, entertaining and yet carries insight that can be quite biting at times. Better still, it is oh so southern. She is a master storyteller who manages to fit whole stories into the space of a short essay. Aspiring writers should study her opening lines and paragraphs to see how a great writer draws a reader in. How about these for opening sentences? "We should have known things were not going well when Mama found a tick doing isometrics under her panty hose." Or "Something about my mother attracts ornithologists." Or "My mother eats things she finds dead on the road." Or "I remember as a little child watching my aunt Belle's wide rump disappear into the cattails and marsh grass at the edge of a pond as she crawled on her hands and knees to meet a giant alligator face to face." Or, perhaps my favorite, "My Uncle Jimbuddy, the cabinet maker, has been cutting off pieces of his fingers for ten years now." With openings like these, how can a reader not be drawn in to find out what in the world she is talking about and how is she going to make a story of it?

Ms. White's stories are so evocative that, by the time you finish reading this slim volume, you feel you're a member of her family, whether you want to be or not, not unlike Kevin, the yankee nephew of Ms. White's aunt Eleanor -- the young man aunt Eleanor wants Ms. White to marry despite the fact that "Kevin has to lie down with with a cold rag on his head after an hour in my company, and . . .I can't seem to breathe normally when I am in the same room with Kevin, and have to go out on the porch and gulp air every ten minutes. . ." You know the dirty laundry, you know the eccentricities, and you know the hurts that are long past but not forgotten, and yet, through all of it you never lose sight of the irony and humor of it all. Moreover, you come to realize that dirty laundry, eccentricities and old hurts are very real parts of all our lives and deserve to be honored and celebrated every bit as much as the things we more typically choose to focus our attentions on.

In short, Ms. White's writing not only entertains, it also informs and uplifts, and I for one am eagerly looking forward to the next time I have the good fortune to pick up one of her books.

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Ratings: 3.95 From 4185 Users | 372 Reviews

Commentary Based On Books Mama Makes Up Her Mind and Other Dangers of Southern Living

Bailey White takes a wide open view of her relatively quiet existence. But she certainly makes a lot seem to happen when it doesnt seem like anything is happening. Kind of like my life. I want her with me when I go to buy a car. Or visit an antiquarian bookstore.

This was a funny book full of stories about the author's family; mostly her eccentric mother. She talked about the small town she lived in and the characters you might come across. These were stories that warmed my heart, because the people reminded me of people I know. At the very end of the book, she talked about being a first grade teacher and some funny happenings. One was where she brought in a snake for her reptile lesson, because the school district could not afford to send the class to a

"Patchwork Crazy Quilt of Southern Hospitality" Mama deserves her own sitcom! Her eccentric no-nonsense brand of maternal philosophy, how she handles neighbors and man-handles strangers provide riotous readingno matter what corner of the country you hail from. The cover of the Vintage Books 1994 edition offers a broad hint into the zany nostalgia inside: a red Porsche and a claw foot bathtub share front porch honors at Mamas homestead, shameless mementoes of Mamas past, permanently ensconced

Funny, sweet, charming vignettes of an unusual lifestyle. The author is a 1st grade teacher and I wonder if she isn't a bit like Miss Frizzle of The Magic School Bus. She takes alligators in stride and her mother can sleep outside calmly during a hurricane. It was worth reading.

I am a fan of southern writers, especially ones that write about life in the south. That being said, this one fell flat for me. The writing style, a short, unrelated story in every 3-4 page chapter, is not my favorite style. There was nothing that held the book together for me, I just wasn't entertained enough to keep reading. I did finish, as this is a book club selection, but I didn't really enjoy the book. Some of the stories were mildly amusing but that's the best I can say. I felt like the

7/21/08.. I started reading this the other day... not exactly what I had expected from a memoir. It's basically a series of short (SHORT!) stories.. maybe 2 or 3 pages each. It's pretty much mindless chatter that is only bits and pieces of her life. I think if she had written it in the true sense of a "memoir" it would be very fascinating. 8/12/08... I just can't finish this book. I hate to get half way through a book and put it down, but I can't waste another minute on this book. Very

Comparing this author to Fannie Flagg is a discredit to the fantastic works of Flagg. Bailey White has a lot of potential to become a great author, but she hasn't reached it yet. I do not understand the great heaps of praise that this book has received. The characters are flat and unexplored beyond the tiny little stories they are featured in, and the stories have no connection between them other than that they were all experienced by the same person, and that Mama is involved someway in almost