The Drugstore

In this coming of age novel, 15-year-old Olivia Stephens works behind the soda fountain in the drugstore of a small town in rural Oklahoma. Obsessed with boys, and the self-inflicted drama in her life, Livy is oblivious to the fascinating, quirky characters who frequent the town's social hub, including a wannabe paramour, a delusional woman who thinks she is a famous movie star, and a 100-year-old Slim Jim and Snickers shop-lifting customer. In addition, because Livy likes to stick her nose in where it doesn't belong, she, along with her grandmother, are thrown right into the middle of the town's most notable mystery - one with the most surprising of outcomes. Livy's naivety makes for a comical pilgrimage through the inside workings of Southern, small-town life and the amusing, idiosyncratic, and lovable characters that make the place what it is. Only after returning to her hometown as an adult, does she realize the gift she was given by being raised in a place that taught her the most valuable of life lessons-that the lowliest are also the loveliest and being different means being blessed.