Books
by Faye Jones
Miss Julia Strikes Back, By Ann B. Ross (Viking, 340 pp., $24.95) The author reads at Davis-Kidd Booksellers on April 10 at 6 p.m. photo: Sarah Sneeden
To recognize Miss Julia Murdoch of Abbotsville, N.C., a true Southerner doesn’t need to read the wildly popular novels by Ann B. Ross: Miss Julia is a senior citizen, but only the most obtuse, or stupid, person would ask her age. She deplores the absence of good manners but knows how to bend the rules when she needs to. She still wears hats and gloves, and not only to church. She never suffers doubt, and no matter what the world throws at her, she manages to come through with both dignity and hair style intact. And because she’s so familiar, newcomers will welcome Miss Julia Strikes Back, the eighth book in the series, as ardently as any confirmed fan of this hen-lit star.
Sam, Miss Julia’s new husband, is on vacation in Russia, and her housemate, Hazel Marie, is on a trip to Mexico. (This is Southern fiction, so it’s no real surprise that Hazel Marie is also the mistress of Miss Julia’s now-dead first husband, as well as the mother of his illegitimate son, Little Lloyd, who also shares her house and whom she is now babysitting.) At loose ends, Miss Julia throws herself a party, but after her friends go home she finds that her wedding and engagement rings are gone—the latter an exact copy of Princess Diana’s—along with all of Hazel Marie’s jewelry. The police suspect a ring of thieves hitting small Southern towns, and the trail seems to end in Palm Beach, Fla.
What’s an old Southern lady to do? Mr. Pickens, the local private investigator, is out of town (Miss Julia suspects with Hazel Marie), but he has mentioned a colleague, Mr. Tuttle, who works in Palm Beach. After several unsuccessful attempts to reach Mr. Tuttle, Miss Julia decides to take Little Lloyd and drive to Florida herself. Her housekeeper, Lillian, sums up the plan in her own inimitable style: “Lemme get this straight. You plannin’ to drive that car down the mountain, and I don’t know how far to Florida just to track down that Mr. Tuttle when you can’t even get him on the telephone, then you plannin’ to make him track down them jew’l thieves when none of them police down there been able to, an’ you gonna be draggin’ that little boy ’long wit you while you doin’ it?” And that’s exactly what she does.
What happens next is classic hen-lit-heads-South wackiness. When Miss Julia reaches Mr. Tuttle’s office, she learns he’s out at a local strip joint, a destination that does not deter her: “There was no mistaking the place of sin when we reached it. A large, flashing neon sign hung above the darkened windows, depicting a hip-shot young woman slinging an article of underclothing on and off in time to all that twitching she was doing. The low beat of a jukebox emanated from the open doors, which were reached through an indentation of the wall. I stood before them holding Lloyd’s hand and wondering if I dared venture into that iniquitous den.” Of course, Miss Julia does venture inside, only to find Mr. Tuttle in no shape to do any investigating. Having few other options, she calls Etta Mae Wiggins, a scandalous friend of Hazel Marie’s, to fly down and assist in a not always successful effort to keep their private investigator sober. Etta Mae may be trashy, but she proves to be an eager and worthwhile ally to Miss Julia as they stake out the jewel thieves’ hideout and pretend to be witnesses for the Lord to get a look inside. Certainly, her feminine wiles prove to be so useful along the way that even Miss Julia must admire them.
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Miss Julia handles all of this with fortitude and confidence that she is pretty much always right. (The only time she’s totally befuddled is when she has to try on some stretch pants at Target.) Her constant lecturing of the either drunk or hung-over Mr. Tuttle provides some of the funniest moments of the book. “And, Mr. Tuttle, I know that you feel so much better now that you’re back doing productive work, making a living, and helping people who are in distress. Let this be a lesson to you whenever you’re tempted to make a return trip to that gin mill I found you in.” As Mr. Tuttle and the jewel thieves discover, those who try to ignore Miss Julia’s lessons don’t stand a chance.