That Just Happened!

Jakes, T.D.  The Memory Quilt: A Christmas Story for Our Times.  Atria Books (2009).

A perfect Christmas for Lela Edwards this year would include the presence of her husband, her three daughters, and her favorite granddaughter, Darcie. They would each be happy, healthy, and properly married. But life doesn’t always unfold in a perfect way, even for God-loving, churchgoing people like these. Lela’s husband of fifty years, Walter, has recently passed, and the daughters now live in towns and states far from the Chicago neighborhood where they were raised.

Darcie is traveling to Missouri City, Texas, to be with her mother, not to Chicago to be with her grandmother, whom she expects to come down hard on her for deciding to divorce her husband and the father of her unborn child. Lela is upset and annoyed with Darcie and herself for breaking her own time-honored tradition of making a quilt to celebrate each family wedding. The quilt is still in separate pieces, and apparently so is the marriage of Doug and Darcie.

The Christmas season is about celebrating the birth and meaning of Christ; about the hope and inspiration that the story we revisit each year offers. So, as the days of the season progress, Lela participates in a Bible study group that focuses on the Virgin Mary. This is the cold season in Chicago and rough weather, literally and figuratively, is ahead for Lela, her family, neighbors, and fellow church members, but in the Scriptures are messages and guidance. If they heed the lessons of the Virgin Mary, they will learn from their mistakes and misjudgments of each other and find favor with God.

Amazon.com

The thing I liked about this book is that it reminds me that Jesus is the Reason for the Season.  (I love that saying!)  Often we forget what is truly important at this time of year and we forget to reflect on why we started celebrating Christmas in the first place.  The story itself carries a good lesson and it’s not very preachy.  Through the main character Lela, we are reminded that charity and open-mindedness is something that we could use all year round, but it is especially relevant during the holidays.  The story is punctuated with passages from the Bible about Mary and the birth of Jesus.  I liked how when Lela reflected on those passages she asked questions, she thought about what it would have been like, instead of just passive acceptance.

The story itself was just ho-hum.  I think the messages were more powerful than the characters or the plot lines.   I found it a little difficult to get into the actual story and I felt that the characters had a lot going on in their heads, but what we read was only what was said.  The characters seemed shallow and it was difficult to figure out everyone’s motivation.  It was a good Christmas story in that it related a lot to Christmas, but if you took that away, it didn’t evoke as much feeling as it should have.  I give this one 3 French Hens.

Pearlman, Ann.  The Christmas Cookie Club.  Atria Books (2009).

Mark your calendar. It’s the Christmas Cookie Club! Every year on the first Monday of December, Marnie and her twelve closest girlfriends gather in the evening with batches of beautifully wrapped homemade cookies. Everyone brings a dish, a bottle of wine and their stories. This year, the stories are especially important. Marnie’s oldest daughter has a risky pregnancy. Will she find out tonight how that story might end? Jeannie’s father is having an affair with her best friend. Who else knew about the betrayal, and how can that be forgiven or forgotten, even among old friends such as these? Rosie’s husband doesn’t want children, and she has to decide whether that’s a deal breaker for the marriage. Taylor’s life is in financial freefall. Each woman, each friend has a story to tell, and they are all interwoven, just as their lives are. On this evening, at least, they can feel as a group the impulses of sisterly love and conflict, the passion and hopefulness of a new romance, the betrayal and disillusionment some relationships bring, the joys and fears of motherhood, the agony of losing a child and above all, the love they have for one another. As Marnie says, the Christmas Cookie Club, if it’s anything, is a reminder of delight. The Christmas Cookie Club is about the paths Marnie and her friends have taken, the absolute joy they take in life. Ultimately, The Christmas Cookie Club is every woman’s story. Celebrating courage and joy in spite of hard times and honoring the importance of women’s friendships and the embracing bonds of community, you’ll see yourself and some of the ingredients of your own story.

The Christmas Cookie Club.com

I thoroughly enjoyed this book.  Each chapter begins with a recipe and a different woman’s story as told by the head “cookie b*tch” Marnie.  I must say, by the end of the book I was ready to go and make dozens and dozens of different Christmas cookies.  It really brought to mind how each year there are four of us who meet to celebrate Christmas, and no matter where we are or what we are doing we get together to spend a Girl’s Christmas.  It is a time to spend with the family you have and the family you create around you, and that is just what these women have done.  There is a real cookie club, but the author swears none of them have gone through the same things as the characters in the book…well, not exactly.  I liked the stories because it further cemented that you are never alone in your experiences and sometimes you just need the warmth of friends (and sugar and wine) to make things seem okay.  This was a heart-warming read and I think a lot of women can relate to at least one or more characters in the book.  I would recommend this one to anyone who is looking for a story about friendship, family, and life…and a good cookie recipe.

The only thing I didn’t enjoy about this book is that there were little blurbs in between all the chapters that tells you where one of the main cookie ingredients comes from.  I felt it didn’t quite fit in with the story and it kind of broke the flow.  However, these sections are easily skipped and returned to at the end, or skipped altogether.  I give this book Five Golden Rings.

Higgins Clark, Mary & Carol Higgins Clark.  The Christmas Thief.  Simon & Schuster Inc.  New York (2004).

Mother and daughter Clark, each a bestseller in her own right, have produced a singularly slight and unmemorable tale with their third holiday suspense novel (after 2001′s He Sees You When You’re Sleeping). This time the villainy centers on an 80-foot Vermont spruce earmarked for the traditional Christmas tree lighting at Rockefeller Center. Unbeknownst to the tree’s owners, its branches contain millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds, secreted there more than a decade earlier by con man Packy Noonan to conceal the proceeds of an investment scam. One of the scam’s victims happens to be vacationing near the site of the planned tree-cutting, along with Alvirah and Willy Meehan, who successfully resolved a kidnapping in their previous caper. When Packy is finally paroled, he heads straight for the treasure, enmeshing him, his confederates, the Meehans and a bevy of other characters in vandalism, abduction and other crimes…

Amazon.com

This is the first book in the Holiday Reading Challenge 2010  hosted by Nely @ All About {n}.   I read a Clark collaboration last year   and this book was similar.  Lots of fluff and not a lot of mystery, but it was a fun read nonetheless.  For the holiday season I’m looking for a fun, easy read about the season and there are a few books that have been tear-jerkers, so I was glad this one was just fun.  The characters are the same as in other books, so if you have read another Alvira mystery, this one is comparable.  I could comment on the plot and character development, but it really isn’t worth it.  If you are looking for a good mystery, this is not the book for you.  If you are looking for a fun, fast read, this is perfect.  It’s a quick holiday read that helps you to get in the holiday mood.  I give this one Four Calling Birds.