Miss Julia

A comic mystery series that takes Southern belle Miss Julia through more twists and turns than the mountain roads she drives.

Abbotsville, North Carolina is home to Miss Julia, a well-off widow of a certain age (60-plus), with impeccable Southern manners and no reservations about speaking her mind. When church and do-gooding fail to satisfy, she keeps busy solving the mysteries (and thwarting the scandals) that come her way. In this humorous series, author Ann B. Ross has created a strong-willed, slightly snooty, big-hearted heroine who handles the mishaps and misunderstandings of small-town life and its colorful characters with aplomb, charm, and wit.

Cynthia Darlow inhabits Miss Julia, to the clear delight of many listeners. The narrator also illuminates the cast of recurring characters, including Miss Julia’s chatty, precocious, adopted great-granddaughter, Latisha; her outspoken housekeeper-friend, Lillian; and her lawyer and suitor, Sam. North Carolina accents and expressions flow from Darlow like honey-sweet tea.

A North Carolina native, Ann B. Ross decided to complete her education when her children were in college, eventually earning her PhD, and became a full-time writer after years of teaching literature and humanities at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. She finds inspiration for Miss Julia’s escapades in all manner of ways - a chance remark, a passing incident, in a dream, or being reminded of something in her past - and relies on her characters to fill in the details of funny and surprising “mini-scenes” that delight fans of the series.