A funny, serious, and compelling novel by Fannie Flagg, author of the beloved Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (and prize-winning co-writer of the classic movie). “[This] tale of tough, eccentric, endearing women who first endure and then prevail. . . . will make you laugh out loud—and shed a few tears. . . . Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! is another rattling success.”— Richmond Times-Dispatch Once again, Flagg's humor and respect and affection for her characters shine forth. Many inhabit small-town or suburban America. But this time, her heroine is urban: a brainy, beautiful, and ambitious rising star of 1970s television. Dena Nordstrom, pride of the network, is a woman whose future is full of promise, her present rich with complications, and her past marked by mystery. Among the colorful cast of characters are: Sookie, of Selma, Alabama, Dena's exuberant college roommate, who is everything that Dena is not; she is thrilled by Dena's success and will do everything short of signing autographs for her; Sookie's a mom, a wife, and a Kappa forever          Dena's cousins, the Warrens, and her aunt Elner, of Elmwood Springs, Missouri, endearing, loyal, talkative, ditsy, and, in their way, wise          Neighbor Dorothy, whose spirit hovers over them all through the radio show that she broadcast from her home in the 1940s          Sidney Capello, pioneer of modern sleaze journalism and privateer of privacy, and Ira Wallace, his partner in tabloid television          Several doctors, all of them taken with—and almost taken in by-Dena There are others, captivated by a woman who tries to go home again, not knowing where home or love lie. “Utterly irresistible.” — Time “Enjoyable . . . [Flagg] keeps it simple, she keeps it bright, she keeps it moving right along—and, most of all, she keeps it beloved.” — The New York Times Book Review “Satisfying . . . [Flagg’s] faith in the healing power of small towns and family are refreshing.” — People Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! is the funny, serious, and compelling new novel by Fannie Flagg, author of the beloved Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (and prize-winning co-writer of the classic movie). Once again, Flagg's humor and respect and affection for her characters shine forth. Many inhabit small-town or suburban America. But this time, her heroine is urban: a brainy, beautiful, and ambitious rising star of 1970s television. Dena Nordstrom, pride of the network, is a woman whose future is full of promise, her present rich with complications, and her past marked by mystery. Fannie Flagg began writing and producing television specials at age nineteen and went on to distinguish herself as an actress and writer in television, films, and the theater. Her first novel, Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man , spent ten weeks on The New York Times paperback bestseller list, and her second novel, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe , spent thirty-six weeks on the same list. It was produced by Universal Pictures as the feature film   Fried Green Tomatoes . Flagg's script was nominated for both the Academy and Writers Guild of America awards, and won the highly regarded Scripters Award. Flagg narrated both novels on audiotape and received a Grammy Award nomination for best spoken word. Flagg lives in Montecito, California. PREFACE Elmwood Springs, Missouri 1948 In the late forties Elmwood Springs, in southern Missouri, seems more or less like a thousand other small towns scattered across America. Downtown is only a block long with a Rexall drugstore on one end and the Elmwood Springs Masonic Hall on the other. If you walk from the Masonic Hall to the Rexall, you will go by the Blue Ribbon cleaners, a Cat's Paw shoe repair shop with a pink neon shoe in the window, the Morgan Brothers department store, the bank, and a little alley with stairs on one side of a building leading up to the second floor, where the Dixie Cahill School of Tap and Twirl is located. If it is a Saturday morning you'll hear a lot of heavy tapping and dropping of batons upstairs by the Tappettes, a troop of blue-spangled Elmwood Springs beauties, or at least their parents think so. Past the alley is the Trolley Car diner, where you can get the world's best chili dog and an orange drink for 15 cents. Just beyond the diner is the New Empress movie theater, and on Saturday afternoons you will see a group of kids lined up outside waiting to go in and see a Western, some cartoons, and a chapter in the Buck Rogers weekly serial. Next is the barber shop and then the Rexall on the corner. Walk down on the other side of the street and you'll come to the First Methodist Church and then Nordstrom's Swedish bakery and luncheonette, with the gold star still in the window in honor of their son. Farther on is Miss Alma's Tea Room, Haygood's photographic studio, the Western Union, and the post office, the telephone company, and Victor's florist shop. A