Miss Julia Hits the Road (2003)

Between Miss Julia and Mrs. Pollifax, I think I could look forward to being an old woman. ( )

Book number four in the popular series starring Miss Julia, a widow of a certain age. This time she gets her hackles up when she learns that a local slumlord is evicting all the poor African-American tenants, so he can demolish the homes and build a water bottling plant on the land. Miss Julia’s housekeeper, Lillian, is one of those tenants and she decides she will find a way to save the properties.

I just love Miss Julia, who frequently gets embroiled in one scandal / scheme or another when she jumps to conclusions and/or fails to fully understand the implications of what she’s been told. But her heart is always in the right place. This time the big fund-raising effort centers on a motorcycle race, and one donor challenges Miss Julia and “other refined, quality women over age fifty” to ride along as a condition of a major donation. What’s a lady to do?!

Miss Julia is just a hoot, and I was laughing aloud at several scenes.

There are two subplots involving Hazel Marie and Mr Pickens, and Binkie and Deputy Coleman. I think the books can be enjoyed as stand-alone novels, but readers probably should start from the beginning to fully appreciate the relationships between the full cast of recurring characters.

NOTE This is a re-read for me, but I first read it long before I joined Goodreads or Shelfari, so I don’t have the date recorded. I’m guessing it was shortly after this book was published. As I recall, I read the first book (Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind) and pretty quickly picked up the next two or three in the series. ( )

Miss Julia on a motorcycle. For fans there is no bigger chuckle. ( )

Still fun ... she's a character.
The books are fun and I'm planning to keep reading the series ... tho' not back-to-back. ( )

More of the irrespressible Miss Julia and her friends. This time they take on a land developer who throws Lillian and her neighbors out of their homes to build a bottling facility for a spring of water of amazing repute. Fun, funny and heartwarming despite itself. ( )