40 Fun Facts About A Redbird Christmas

The orphaned hero of A Redbird Christmas tells his landlady he was named after which everyday pantry item?

A can of soup is where his name came from, he admits when Betty Kitchen coaxes out his life story.

Jack, the pet redbird in Fannie Flagg's A Redbird Christmas, is which bird known for the male's bright red feathers?

Cardinal and redbird are two names for the same bird, and Jack is no ordinary one: he is the unofficial mascot of Lost River.

How does Claude Underwood deliver the mail around Lost River in Fannie Flagg's A Redbird Christmas?

By boat is how Claude makes his rounds, just as carriers do on Alabama's real Magnolia River, said to be the only year-round river mail route in the US.

Which wintry Midwestern city does Oswald T. Campbell leave behind for Alabama in A Redbird Christmas?

Chicago is in the grip of an early November blizzard as the story opens, with Oswald trudging through slush to a fateful appointment.

A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg earned an Oscar nomination for adapting which of her novels for the screen?

Fried Green Tomatoes began as her 1987 novel about the Whistle Stop Cafe, and the 1991 film starred Kathy Bates and Jessica Tandy.

The secret society of Lost River women in A Redbird Christmas is the Mystic Order of the Royal what?

Polka Dots is the name, and its members do good deeds on the sly, which includes fixing up the unattached men of the town.

Which rare weather reaches the Alabama town of Lost River for the holiday in A Redbird Christmas?

A snowfall arrives on top of the small miracle the townsfolk arrange for Patsy, a rare sight in a town Oswald chose for its mild winters.

Which terminal lung disease is Oswald T. Campbell diagnosed with at the start of A Redbird Christmas?

Emphysema gives Oswald barely a year to live, so he heads for a warmer place expecting to spend one last holiday there.

Oswald phones Lost River about a health resort from an old brochure in A Redbird Christmas and learns what?

It burned down in 1911, decades before his call, so the woman who answers the phone finds him a room with a neighbor instead.

A teacher who saw A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg on a TV game show wrote to say she had which condition?

Dyslexia showed in the pattern of her misspelled answers, and Flagg said she had never heard of the condition until the teacher's note arrived.

Roy Grimmit, keeper of the redbird Jack in A Redbird Christmas, runs which Lost River business?

The grocery store, which also sells bait and beer, is the only one in town, so almost everybody drops in on Roy and his bird.

Which physical problem does the neglected young Patsy have when she first appears in A Redbird Christmas?

A twisted leg makes every trip into town a struggle for Patsy, yet she keeps limping in to visit the bird at Roy's shop.

Who gives Oswald T. Campbell the old brochure for an Alabama health resort in A Redbird Christmas?

His doctor recalls that his own father used to send lung patients there, and digs the brochure out of the old man's files.

The people of Lost River hold bake sales and pancake breakfasts in A Redbird Christmas to pay for what?

A child's operations are the cause: Patsy needs a costly series of them, so the whole town pitches in with one fundraiser after another.

Which loss do the people of Lost River fear will devastate young Patsy in A Redbird Christmas?

The bird's death would crush her, so the townsfolk set about arranging a small miracle for her instead.

In which Alabama city was A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg born and largely raised?

Birmingham was home for nearly all of her childhood, apart from a brief spell on the Gulf Coast near the town of Point Clear.

Before writing A Redbird Christmas, Fannie Flagg often sat beside Richard Dawson as a panelist on which 1970s show?

Match Game made her a semi-regular through the 1970s, usually in the lower right-hand seat of its celebrity panel.

A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg won a 2012 Alabama writers' award named after which novelist?

Harper Lee gives her name to the prize for Alabama's Distinguished Writer of the Year, open to authors born or raised in the state.

Frances Cleverdon, the matchmaker of A Redbird Christmas, keeps a fabulous collection of which tableware?

Gravy boats are Frances Cleverdon's pride, and her kitchen is pink, two of the charms that catch Oswald's eye.

Betty Kitchen, who gives Oswald bed and board in A Redbird Christmas, formerly worked in which job?

Army nurse was her old job, and she now shares her house with her elderly mother, Miss Alma, and their new lodger.

Mildred, the woman Frances wants Oswald to court in A Redbird Christmas, keeps changing what every few days?

Her hair color turns another outrageous shade every few days, which worries the matchmaker trying to pair her off.

Matchmaker Frances Cleverdon hopes to pair newcomer Oswald with which relative of hers in A Redbird Christmas?

Her sister Mildred is the intended match, one of several unattached women in a town that is short of eligible men.

Before Frances Cleverdon takes her in, Patsy is left in whose neglectful care in A Redbird Christmas?

Her stepmother has children of her own to raise and no interest in Patsy, whose father has left town, so Frances offers the girl a home.

Where is the solitary Oswald T. Campbell living when Fannie Flagg's A Redbird Christmas begins?

A men's hotel is his only address, and with few friends and no children he can wind up his affairs in no time.

Which complaint of Oswald's almost disappears once he settles into Lost River in A Redbird Christmas?

His cough is almost nonexistent by the time he has got to know everyone, a surprise for a man who arrived expecting to die.

How did Jack the redbird first come into Roy Grimmit's care in A Redbird Christmas?

As a rescued fledgling, Jack was hand-fed by Roy, a strapping man who doesn't care who teases him for doting on a bird.

In which part of Alabama does Fannie Flagg set the river community of A Redbird Christmas?

The far south of the state is home to Lost River, a sleepy community on a lazy winding river that time seems to have forgotten.

Jack the redbird is loved by all in A Redbird Christmas despite which bad habit in Roy's shop?

Pecking at the fruit is forgiven because the whole town dotes on Jack, its unofficial mascot.

Which community across the river has a long-standing feud with everybody else in A Redbird Christmas?

The Creoles keep to the other side of the river because of the feud, yet even they rally round Patsy as the holiday nears.

What has Oswald T. Campbell falsely told his physician he gave up at the start of A Redbird Christmas?

Smoking is the habit he claims to have quit, which is why he cannot light up while he waits for his test results.

Which childhood illness had already scarred Oswald T. Campbell's lungs before the events of A Redbird Christmas?

Tuberculosis in childhood left scars that later chest troubles made far worse, which is why one more bad winter could kill him.

Which Fannie Flagg novel about Elmwood Springs, Missouri, was published just before A Redbird Christmas?

Standing in the Rainbow follows one small town across five decades; the holiday tale was her next book.

Fannie Flagg appeared on Good Morning America to share what from her novel A Redbird Christmas?

Recipes from the book were her subject on the show, a natural fit for an author who had already published a Whistle Stop Cafe cookbook.

A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg took a stage name because which Oscar-winning actress shared her birth name?

Patricia Neal was already registered with Actors' Equity, the stage actors' union, so the newcomer had to work under a new name: Fannie Flagg.

Which Allen Funt TV show hired A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg as a staff writer in the 1960s?

Candid Camera's creator spotted her filling in for a sick performer at a New York nightclub, and she later appeared on the show too.

Whom does Oswald T. Campbell list as his closest living relative on a medical form in A Redbird Christmas?

His ex-wife, Helen, is the only family he can name, and he declines when asked whether she should be called in to hear the news.

What is Oswald T. Campbell's only income when he is told to leave home in A Redbird Christmas?

A disability pension is all he has, which rules out a pricey Florida winter and sends the search toward cheaper places.

What did A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg win as a teenage contestant in the Miss Alabama pageant?

An acting scholarship was her prize, and decades later she wrote I Still Dream About You, a comic mystery about a former Miss Alabama.

Fannie Flagg's debut, Coming Attractions, was reissued in 1992 under which title?

Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man is told as the diary of an 11-year-old girl, and it spent 10 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.

A Redbird Christmas author Fannie Flagg has a small on-screen role in which hit 1978 movie musical?

Grease put her on the Rydell High staff, one of several film parts alongside Five Easy Pieces and Stay Hungry.