List $14.99

Written & audio book performed by Adriana Trigiani - Abridged Fiction - 4 COMPACT DISCS - 5 hours

Publisher, Random House Audiobooks (August 2006)

Comments about the printed version:

"Big Stone Gap is a southern novel that has the ring of truth, by which I mean its characters are bizarre, its story is hilarious, and that it hooked me on page one." --John Berendt

"Have there ever been more engaging late bloomers than Ave Maria Mulligan and her circle of doting, meddlesome friends? Adriana Trigiani writes with wit and grace about misguided romances and family secrets, and so very winningly about generous hearts. This urban Yankee reader found hours of bliss in Big Stone Gap, Virginia." --Elinor Lipman

"Funny, charming and original!" --Fannie Flagg

"It is one of my all-time favorite novels . . . unforgettable." --Whoopi Goldberg

"I have not enjoyed a novel this much since Cold Mountain. The characters are exquisitely and richly drawn. Ave Maria Mulligan is so real, she is almost a miracle. The story is poignant without being sentimental, and funny without being mean, and the story, the people, and the place of Big Stone Gap have stayed with me long after reading the book." --Rosanne Cash

It's 1978 and 35-year-old Ave Maria Mulligan is the self-proclaimed spinster of Big Stone Gap, Virginia, a sleepy hamlet in the Blue Ridge Mountains. As the local pharmacist, she's been keeping the town folks' secrets for years, but she's about to discover a skeleton in her own family's tidy closet that will blow the lid right off her quiet, uneventful life. Soon she finds herself juggling two marriage proposals, conducting a no-holds-barred family feud, directing the prestigious Outdoor Drama and keeping the town's dysfunctional Rescue Squad on its toes.

The crazy-quilt of characters includes Jack MacChesney ("Jack Mac" to his friends), the stoic miner with coal dust on his hands but love in his heart; Iva Lou Wade, the sexpot Bookmobile librarian; Theodore Tipton, band leader extraordinaire; Preacher Elmo Gaspar, the snake-handling Freewill Baptist; and Pearl Grimes, a coal-miner's daughter on the verge of a miraculous transformation, thanks to Ave's intervention.

About the Author: Adriana Trigiani grew up in Big Stone Gap, Virginia in the 1970s. She has honed her storytelling abilities over a decade of writing and producing some of television's top-rated shows, including the ground-breaking Cosby Show. Trigiani is also an award-winning playwright and documentary filmmaker. She lives in New York City with her husband.