Side Effects A New Orleans Love Story

"Long before Katrina, the sharp curves of the Mississippi created the improbable New Orleans intersection of South Claiborne and South Carrollton. Here sits N.O. Drugstore, separating nothing from nothing and everything from everything, black Pigeontown from white Tulane." "In this new novel by Patty Friedmann, the lives of three drugstore employees - two black, one white - become intertwined somewhere between Patient Consultation and Pick-up. Behind the pharmacy counter they are given a unique perspective on New Orleans, and as their individual stories intersect they experience firsthand the complications of friendship and romance in the floods and storms of inevitable family dramas." "Luciana Jambon - Ciana for short - was raised by a proper uptown Catholic mother in a turn-of-the-century house where problems were discussed over a stack of pecan pancakes. With an overly critical brother, a vicious sister-in-law, and a younger man who has her lovesick at work, it's no wonder that in ten minutes Ciana can polish off half a king cake." "Unlike Ciana, Vendetta Greene did not go straight from high school into college and graduate school, "and then scuttle like a scared cockroach behind the counter." Rather, becoming a mother at eighteen made Vendetta wise up fast. Even with one sister drunk all the time, the other asking for free Ritalin, a bright daughter teased mercilessly at school, and an ex-husband driven away by her family, it's still Vendetta who doles out the best advice." "And then there's Lennon Israel, the well-educated, dreadlocked man who shares a small space behind the counter with these two larger-than-life women. When he becomes romantically entangled with Ciana and, by consequence, with her family mystery, it's only a matter of time before everyone involved is experiencing all kinds of side effects."--BOOK JACKET.

Patty Friedmann has written five previous novels, including Eleanor Rushing, Secondhand Smoke, and Odds. Except for slight interruptions for education and natural disasters, she has always lived in New Orleans.