An Irish Christmas
by Melody Carlson
Published by Baker Publishing Group
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Reviewed by Carrie Padgett
Certain elements are expected in a holiday movie or book. It shall have a happy ending. There will be stormy weather, families, and faith. It will be entertainment light; undemanding and as comfortable as a grilled cheese sandwich.
Melody Carlson’s An Irish Christmas meets all those expectations.
Colleen Frederick is a new widow with a secret she needs to tell her young adult son. Jamie Frederick has his own burdens to confess to his mother.
Set in the early 1960s, Carlson’s novel moves from Pasadena, California to Ireland, a trip Colleen hopes will help her and Jamie reconnect and will make the perfect setting for her confession. Mother and son each tell their secrets, confounding the other. When Jamie, angry and defensive, leaves for a day trip and is detained with no way to let his mom know he’s fine, Colleen is forced to rely on the God she has had little time for lately.
Jamie’s world is rocked by Colleen’s news and he reacts by becoming defensive and ignoring his own deceit. Jamie must confront himself and his shortcomings in Connemara, including why he deceived his parents back home. The people he meets in Ireland, especially a stranger in a local restaurant, help lead him back to his mother and to his own new relationship with God.
The book is written in first person with Colleen and Jamie alternating chapters. Jamie’s voice in his sections is too similar to Colleen’s; sometimes I missed who I was supposed to be listening to. Jamie often didn’t sound like a young adult, much less one in the early 1960s.
Carlson does a good job making Ireland real and the Irish characters come alive in the pages of her story.
An Irish Christmas will leave you with a light heart and a comforted spirit, much like a comfort food on a rainy day.
Armchair Interviews says: Well-written, this is a quick read for the busy holiday season.
Author’s Web site: http://www.MelodyCarlson.com