Six of One

by Rita Mae Brown

Book Overview

Perched right on the Mason-Dixon line, tiny Runnymede, Maryland, is ripe with a history almost as colorful as the women who live there--from Celeste Chalfonte, headstrong and aristocratic, who murders... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060105240
• ISBN13: 9780060105242
• Release Date: January 1978
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Length: 310 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.

Customer Reviews

One of my 2 favorite all time reads...

I read this when I was very young, not long after reading the gripping but totally depressing Well of Loneliness. Six of One was the first lesbian title I read that made me laugh and feel hopeful. What a Joy!!

A hilarious family saga on the Mason Dixon Line

As the town of Runneymede is divided by the Mason Dixon Line, so is the family that Rita Mae Brown chronicles through several generations in this, one of her best loved and most popular books. Nobody writes internal family bitchy dialogue better than RMB, and she's off and running at top speed in Six of One. Love and war are nothing when it comes to sibling rivalry in a small town. Cora is the mother of this contentious clan of spirited, cranky, opinionated women. Spanning years from the early 1900s to the 1980s, the book alternates between past tense for the old years and present tense (told in the POV of Nickel, the bisexual daughter of Juts, one of the feuding sisters) for the more modern years.Wonderful, nearly epic, and very very funny.

Rita Mae Brown at her best!

"Six of One" is a rousing tale of two sisters told by Rita Mae Brown in her unapologetic, eccentric Southern style. She introduces us to Julia and Louise Hunsenmeir, fondly known as Juts and Wheezie, an indomitable pair of quarreling sisters born around the turn-of-the-century in Runnymede, Maryland. Spanning almost a century, we watch the madcap life of Juts and Wheezie take them from small tots following their mother around in the local rich lesbian's Georgian mansion to the birth of their own children and the mayhem that follows, to Juts and Wheezie as old cronies, still tangling in their 80's. The ensemble cast features Cora, their strong and caring single mother, housekeeper of Celeste; the formidable Celeste Chalfonte, a charming lesbian without apology, and her lover, the elegantly beautiful Ramelle Bowman; Fairy Thatcher and Fannie Jump Creighton, ever-scheming schoolchums of Celeste; and in later chapters, Chessie and Pearlie, long-suffering husbands of Juts and Wheezie. These eccentric characters embody all the character flaws and quirks one would expect from a Rita Mae Brown novel depicting Southern characters, and is done as only she can.Simply put, "Six of One" is a hoot! You'll laugh, cry, and laugh again at the shenanigans of this Runnymede bunch! Don't miss it

One of the top five best books of the 20th century.

Six of One deserves to be ranked among the best works of modern authors in America. Rita Mae Brown's wit, wisdom, and winning prose capture the true flavor of much of the 20th century, with realistic characterizations which universally represent much of what is familiar to us all. This is not a book about a single subject, it is a book about life, and about love. But most of all it is a book about perspective and the genuine values in life. In this book, laughter resides at the top of the list. God help us all if Rita Mae Brown ever writes a comedy...I nearly died of laughter from this work of real life drama!