“I’ll be home for Chriiiiistmas, you can plan on me. . .” In the James Patterson/Richard DiLallo novel, The Christmas Wedding, that is exactly what Gaby Summerhill hopes her children will be singing after they read her latest email. Having spent the last 3 years apart and living in different states since their father’s untimely death, Gaby hopes to reunite her four grown children. She even throws in a little mystery to sweeten the deal. She invites them home for Christmas to attend her wedding to a secret groom. It’s so secret; in fact, even the groom doesn’t know he’s been chosen.
In The Christmas Wedding, Patterson and DiLallo (who also collaborated on a book in the wildly popular Alex Cross series) craft a lighthearted tale about a woman who may have lost her husband but is determined to keep hold of her family. In the book, each of her children, Claire, Emily, Seth and Lizzie are dealing with their own personal struggles.
Claire’s husband smokes weed in the basement all day, Emily wants to save the world but also make partner at her stuffy law firm, Seth is trying to sell his book so he can marry his longtime girlfriend and Lizzie struggles to help her husband recover from brain cancer. I am now reminded of my favorite quote from the popular Broadway show, Dreamgirls, “Effie, we all got pain.” Through it all, Gaby, their straightforward loving matriarch, is the anchor, the tie that binds them. But who will anchor Gaby now that her beloved Peter is gone?
The mysterious groom was a fun little twist that kept the reader guessing until the end of the book but the heart of the story was about family. I’m a mother with two young children and I can’t bear the thought of them ever leaving home. I know some day they’ll be immersed in their own lives and rely on me less and less. Like Gaby’s kids, I hope they’ll still need their mama because like Gaby, their mama will always need them.
Read this in front of a cozy fire with a warm cup of apple cider and when you’re done, you’ll be texting and Facebooking your siblings, children and parents to say, “I love you, man.”
I’ve been reading a lot of steampunk novels recently. I’ve been using the excuse that it’s research for the TV dramedy pilot I’m writing. But really, it’s just a lot of fun to read.
Lilith Saintcrow is one of my favorite authors. I knew of her from her Dante Valentine series, but was late to the game due to being seriously behind on my TBR, so I never opened the door to that world. When Night Shift (Jill Kismet series, Book #1) debuted, I thumbed through the blue and white paperback about a nightside Hunter and was hooked before purchase with the anonymous quote that set the tone for the series, “The most terrible thing to face is one’s own soul.”