Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Evelyn is dissatisfied with the life she has reached in middle age when Mrs. Threadgoode begins telling her about Whistle Stop, Alabama. The stories centre on Idgie and Ruth, whose cafe becomes a gathering place during the 1930s. Around its tables, ordinary routines mingle with fierce loyalties, local secrets and the possibility of murder. As Evelyn listens, the older woman's memories create a connection between a vanished community and the choices still available in her own present. Fannie Flagg's novel moves between these intertwined lives, giving the relationship between Idgie and Ruth a central place in Whistle Stop's history. Food, friendship and storytelling become ways of sustaining people through change, loss and the judgments of their neighbours.