Queen Bee of Mimosa Branch

This debut women’s fiction is “a veritable goldmine of Southern homespun homilies and hospitality, where the Ya-Ya sisterhood would feel right at home” (Booklist).

Southern housewife Linwood Breedlove Scott was happily content in her comfortable, complacent thirty-year marriage, but when her husband cleans out their bank accounts and runs off with a stripper, her life takes a hilarious, yet touching, right turn into reality.

With no place to go but home, she's forced back to her insular hometown and the “eccentric” family she escaped by marrying at nineteen: her senile father, her loving-yet-controlling mother, her long-suffering aunt, her crazy uncle, and her good-for-nothing brother. But despite her newly dependent situation and her family’s genteel insanity, Lin begins to stand on her own two feet and wake up to the joys—and perils—of life as a single woman. And she also learns surprising lessons about her family: that things aren’t always what they seem, and that the power of love governs even the most dysfunctional of relationships. This joy-filled, moving, and wise-cracking novel delivers a portrait of Southern life, Southern families, and self-discovery that readers will never forget.

“Haywood Smith paints a portrait of lasting relationships between family and lifelong friends in the small-town South. Her colorful cast of characters is unforgettable.” —Southern Living

“Snapshots of Southern living will charm even the hardest-hearted Yankee.” —Publishers Weekly

“Hilariously on the mark . . . the perfect combination of wit and touching sentiment . . . [A] one-of-a-kind feel-good read.” —Romantic Times

“A hilarious slice of life.” —Midwest Book Review