Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man
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| Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man | |
 paperback cover |
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| Author | Fannie Flagg |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Historical novel |
| Publisher | Warner Books |
| Publication date | 1981 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover and Paperback) |
| Pages | 320 pp |
| ISBN | ISBN 0446394521 |
Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man is a 1981 novel by best-selling author Fannie Flagg. It was originally published under the title "Coming Attractions". The story is a series of diary entries that chronicle the main character's years growing up in Mississippi from 1952 to 1957.
[edit] Plot summary
Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man is told in diary writings starting in 1952 when the protagonist, Daisy Fay, is 11 years old. She lives with her mother and her father in Jackson, Mississippi. Her father involves her in many of his ill-working schemes to make money or build inventions. He alienates his family members but makes great friends when he drinks. Her mother lives in a constant state of embarrassment, and tries to do what she can to make Daisy Fay into a lady, which consists of making her fetch endless cups of coffee in the cafeteria, and buying matching mother-daughter outfits. Her mother believes she married beneath her. The diary reveals Daisy Fay has an expansive imagination and a detailed memory as a long list of endearing and strange characters are described and the story is told in humorous vignettes.
Soon after the beginning of the diary, Daisy Fay and her parents move to Shell Beach, Mississippi after her father bought half a share of a malt shop on the beach with $500 her mother won at a Bingo game. Her father's plan is to become a taxidermist during the off season, and to use the malt shop's freezer to store the dead animals before stuffing them. Her parents relationship becomes more tempestuous as her father drinks too much and hangs around a vindinctive crop duster named Jimmy Snow, and they manage to get into impossible situations. When the fall starts, Daisy Fay starts the 6th grade and meets her classmates, which include the very snobby and spoiled Kay Bob Benson, who serves as a nemesis for Daisy Fay throughout the rest of the book.
The taxidermy doesn't seem to work out well, as the bobcat had a smile on its face and the flamingo's neck was crooked. Added to that is the fact that Daisy Fay's father didn't add bread to the hamburgers, and his drinking increased. After the malt shop burns down in a suspicious fire (the insurance money wasn't enough anyway), Daisy Fay's mother leaves her father to live with her sister in Virginia. With her mother gone, her father devises a three-day scheme with a local preacher to use Daisy Fay as a "glory getter" to bring her back from the dead and bilk the faithful religious out of their donations. The plan falls apart of course, when Daisy is asked to heal a handicapped girl, the girl walked, and the crowd went berserk. Her father and she had to escape quickly in Jimmy Snow's cropduster to Florida, and the diary takes a hiatus for four years.
When the diary resumes, the year is 1956, Daisy is 16, and she has returned to Shell Beach from living in a Catholic boarding school in Jackson. Her father still drinks - maybe even more, but her mother died from cancer. Daisy Fay enters high school to find Kay Bob snobbier than ever, but now has a best friend, Pickle Watkins, to endure the trials of high school. Pickle is obsessed with being accepted by the popular seniors and gets them into situations where they must better themselves socially. Daisy Fay lives in various apartments, hotels, and porches with her father and Jimmy Snow. Pickle gets pregnant by her father, a member of the White Citizens Council and drops out of school. So does Daisy Fay soon after and becomes involved in a community theater in Jackson after they move back. She manages the spotlight, then becomes an actor in the various plays and musicals they put on.
Seeing her only break to be a professional actress, Daisy Fay enters the Miss Mississippi pageant meeting, once more, Kay Bob Benson, who is a competitor. With a lot of help from a lot of people (some of it not quite legitimate), she wins the pageant, and is off to Atlantic City as the book ends.
[edit] Trivia
Daisy Fay's Aunt Bess is a minor character, but has a cafe Daisy Fay loves to visit. Her aunt plays tricks on everyone, such as putting mustard in a baby doll's diaper and driving Daisy Fay's mother to distraction with her lack of social propriety. This character is based on Fannie Flagg's real life Aunt Bess, who ran the Irondale Cafe in Irondale, Alabama. She is the basis for the character of Idgie in Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe.
