Reviewed by Jeanne
This time of year I especially enjoy a good Christmas story. Oh, I’ll read one anytime; I’m not one of those to turn my nose up at a book set in a different season, but there’s just something about having the holiday swirl around you when you’re reading a book that enriches both experiences.
The problem is that the holidays bring deadlines, tasks, and gatherings, which puts a crimp into my reading time. This year I picked up a slim collection by an assortment of North Carolina writers and found it was just the ticket. The selections are short, many under ten pages, and a few are excerpts from other works. Authors include Lee Smith, Robert Morgan, Sue Ellen Bridgers, and Kaye Gibbons.
I’m not sure what I originally expected, but I found myself utterly charmed. While the title had me expecting mostly short stories, I found them to seem more like memoir and essay which I liked. I first turned to Lee Smith’s “Christmas Letters,” thinking it would be a selection from her novella of the same name but it turned out to be a lovely reflection on those “Here’s what I’ve been doing” letters that show up in the Christmas cards. As a person who writes such letters, I found her thoughts on it to be enlightening and heartening. I flipped the pages and randomly selected another entry, “Santa’s Coming, Regardless” by Robert Inman which was another winner, and one that will stick with me for Daddy Jake’s wise words about Santa. Some selections are indeed previously published –Kaye Gibbons’ selection is from her novel Ellen Foster—but most seem to be original.
This is a fine collection, and some would be good for reading aloud. The brevity doesn’t affect the quality, and I really liked that they weren’t all tear-jerkers. Many had a definite Appalachian quality to them.
If you’re looking to take a break this holiday season, I think you’ll find much to enjoy in this volume.
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