In her colorful first novel, Crazy Ladies, Michael Lee West brought to life three generations of unforgettable G. R. I. T. S. (Girls Raised In The South), creating a world the Washington Post Book World called "sharp, wry, and utterly convincing." In Mad Girls in Love she's brought some of the Ladies back and also added a whole new wacky and lovable cast. You'll want to join them for a glass of sweet tec or punch spiked with pure grain alcohol and get the real gossip.

At the center of the group is Bitsy, a self-proclaimed girly-girl who "couldn't name the presidents in order, but... knew the name and manufacturer of every lipstick and eye shadow in Rexall Drugs." Mad Girls in Love follows Bitsy from our first glimpse of her as an eighteen-year-old wife and mother on the lam with her baby daughter through two decades as she develops into a worldly blond beauty.

Michael Lee West writes about the women of Crystal Falls, Tennessee, and their men with the expertise of a down-home cook who knows just how much hot sauce to add so the cornbread isn't too sweet. Reading Mad Girls in Love is like settling into a chair on a porch or at the Utopian Beauty Salon - only much better