Wise-cracking Wiley Cantrell is loud and roaringly outrageous -- and he needs to be to keep his deeply religious neighbors and family in the Deep South at bay. A failed writer on food stamps, Wiley works a minimum wage job and barely manages to keep himself and his deaf son, Noah, more than a stone’s throw away from Dumpster-diving. Noah was a meth baby and has the birth defects to prove it. He sees how lonely his father is and tries to help him find a boyfriend while Wiley struggles to help Noah have a relationship with his incarcerated mother, who believes the best way to feed a child is with a slingshot. No wonder Noah becomes Wiley’s biggest supporter when Boston nurse Jackson Ledbetter walks past Wiley’s cash register and sets his sugar tree on fire. Jackson falls like a wet mule wearing concrete boots for Wiley’s sense of humor. And while Wiley represents much of the best of the South, Jackson is hiding a secret that could threaten this new family in the making. When North meets South, the cultural misunderstandings are many, but so are the laughs, and the tears, but, as they say down in Dixie, it’s all good.

Shaking the Sugar Tree

Then they did some ballroom-style moves sprinkled with well-timed pratfalls and other foolishness.


They received a well-deserved round of applause when they were through.


Mama passed around more eggnog and the vodka starting going to my head. By the time we got to Midnight Mass I was having trouble walking in a straight line. 72: A Visit from Santa


Noah woke me the following morning, his eyes saying it was Christmas.


I was in Jackson Ledbetter’s arms in the “master bedroom” of our new apartment, could feel his warm skin against my back.


I shook my head again. I’d had entirely too much vodka the night before and I was paying for it.


I pulled Noah into bed and snuggled with him. He permitted this for about one minute. Then he sat up and pushed the covers off us.


It’s Christmas!Noah signed happily. Get up!


Chapter 95