Good Ol' Mary Kay Andrews Catches, Scores with "Spring Fever"

"Spring Fever" by Mary Kay Andrews
Reviewed by David Marshall James

Fetch your flip-flops and floppy hats, 'cause your juicy, jammin' summertime read will be here before you know it.

Ordinarily, we wouldn't give such advance notice of an upcoming book; however, we really wanted to spread the good word on this treat.

It's nice to have something to look forward to, so place your order or budget in the cost of a bookstore copy, 'cause this is a keeper. You'll probably want to re-read it at least once during the summer.

The "Good Ol' Mary Kay Andrews" has returned. We've read all nine of her stand-alone novels, and this is her magnum opus. (Thus far, we hope.)

We never give away key plot points, and we're going to be just in-general here, so you can truly savor each surprise, large and small.

The story centers on the third and fourth (well, the fifth, too, but they're all young-uns) generations behind a family-owned soft-drink company in small-town Passcoe, North Carolina.

The Bayless family has been moving the town forward, as its principal employer and benefactor, since 1922, with Quixie-- a sweet/tart cherry soda-- although the two fourth-generation sons, Mason and Davis, who are running the company have decidedly different views on management.

Davis has brought in a corporate consultant, Celia Wakefield, who has fixed her hooks in Mason, whose ex-wife, Annajane Hudgens, continues to work in the marketing division of Quixie.

Annajane grew up in Passcoe, the BFF of the fourth-generation Bayless daughter, Pauline (Pokey).

The novel opens with the wedding ceremony of Mason and Celia, whom Pokey deplores as a total "phony."

Annajane, in attendance at the insistence of her stepchild, Sophie-- in service as the flower girl-- is planning to leave her hometown of Passcoe, with a new job and fiance lined up in Atlanta.

The author net-whooshes the ball with all these and many other characters; with the back-and-forth's and in's and out's of the plot; and most of all with the whole business and history of Quixie and what it represents vis a vis the grab-it-and-gobble-it-and-spit-out-the-bones, the raid-it-and-loot-it mentalities prevalent in what passes for today's economics.

Quixie not only represents a family's legacy and a town's sustenance, but also a time when an ice-cold swig of pop on a July afternoon was the ultimate in refreshment, when company employees were considered family-- with all the attendant benefits, including the security of a lifelong job, then a comfortable retirement.

Companies such as Quixie formed America's spine, supplied its bread-and-butter, made it the greatest place on Earth for opportunity and advancement.

Wish we could visit Passcoe this summer, with an extended stay at the newly renovated and refurbished Pinecone Motel (fresh-baked muffins and hot coffee in the morning), and tour the soft-drink plant, then down some seriously chilled cherry soda in a retro bottle complete with the Dixie, the Quixie Pixie logo-- if only they all existed.

We'll just have to re-read the book instead.