The Sunday Salon and Holiday Themed Novels

Welcome to The Sunday Salon! It's the day of the week where we sit down and talk books. So, pull up a chair, get comfy, grab a cup of joe and relax. The Christmas season seems to be flying by fast with just a little over 2 weeks until Christmas. Are you done with your Christmas shopping?! Are you taking time for yourself to relax? Sometimes Christmas can be a hectic, stressful time of year. So, today's post is about relaxing with a good Christmas themed book, that let's you slip out of hectic and remember what the season is all about with these stories that find hope, romance and miracles within their pages. Here are some novels that I found that may just fit the bill….

The Snowglobe by Sheila Roberts… On a blustery afternoon, Kylie Gray wanders into an antique shop and buys an enchanting snow globe.  “There’s a story behind that snow globe,” the antique dealer tells her.  The original owner, he explains, was a German toymaker who lost his wife and son right before Christmas.  When the grieving widower received the handcrafted snow globe as a Christmas gift, he saw the image of a beautiful woman beneath the glass—a woman who would come into his life, mend his broken heart and bring him back to the world of the living.  For years, the snow globe has passed from generation to generation, somehow always landing in the hands of a person in special need of a Christmas miracle.

Every year my book club reads one of Sheila Roberts Christmas theme novels. This was the first that we read and it was wonderful, charming and was like a nice cup of cocoa on a cold wintry night. Sheila knows how to write characters that we can relate to and like. Her books have wonderful romance without the need for overtly sexual scenes. And this book is short, under 200 pages, and should be easy to fit into a busy schedule.

Candlelight Christmas by Susan Wiggs… A single father who yearns to be a family man, Logan O'Donnell is determined to create the perfect Christmas for his son, Charlie. The entire O'Donnell clan arrives to spend the holidays in Avalon, a postcard-pretty town on the shores of Willow Lake, a place for the family to reconnect and rediscover the special gifts of the season. One of the guests is a newcomer to Willow Lake—Darcy Fitzgerald. Sharp-witted, independent and intent on guarding her heart, she's the last person Logan can see himself falling for. And Darcy is convinced that a relationship is the last thing she needs this Christmas. Yet between the snowy silence of the winter woods, and toasty moments by a crackling fire, their two lonely hearts collide. The magic of the season brings them each a gift neither ever expected—a love to last a lifetime.

Susan Wiggs is a favorite among romance readers, and this is her newest Christmas themed novel.

Starry Night by Debbie Macomber… Carrie Slayton, a big-city society-page columnist, longs to write more serious news stories. So her editor hands her a challenge: She can cover any topic she wants, but only if she first scores the paper an interview with Finn Dalton, the notoriously reclusive author. Living in the remote Alaskan wilderness, Finn has written a megabestselling memoir about surviving in the wild. But he stubbornly declines to speak to anyone in the press, and no one even knows exactly where he lives. Digging deep into Finn’s past, Carrie develops a theory on his whereabouts. It is the holidays, but her career is at stake, so she forsakes her family celebrations and flies out to snowy Alaska. When she finally finds Finn, she discovers a man both more charismatic and more stubborn than she even expected. And soon she is torn between pursuing the story of a lifetime and following her heart.

Another favorite in the romance category, this is Debbie Macomber's newest Christmas themed novel.

Do you enjoy Holiday themed novels? Would you read them any other time of year? I think that it's a treat that some of our favorite authors write something special for the Holiday season. A book that we can enjoy on it's own without further commitment. What are your favorite Holiday themed novels?

Hope you are enjoying the season and are able to relax a bit and open a good book. Maybe one of these books will be the answer to that!

Happy reading… Suzanne