The Book: For Christmas, Father Tim's wife Cynthia tells him she wants a letter from him. But after writing a deeply personal love letter from his heart, Father Tim finds that it has somehow gone missing! Through a comedy of errors the letter ends up being passed around (although not necessarily read) by the community, causing unexpected revelations. This is Karon's 15th novel in the Mitford series, which is set in the fictional small mountain town of Mitford, North Carolina. By this time, Father Tim is retired but still active in the community and Cynthia is still creating her children's books. The characters that started as children are now grown with children of their own. Characters that were middle aged to start with are now old. But as usual in a Karon novel, although the characters have (sometimes very bad) problems, they still get through life by believing in the power of "love thy neighbor" and they believe in the power of prayer.
The Author: Jan Karon
Genre: General Fiction (Christian Fiction, Southern Fiction, Holiday Fiction)
Length: 406 pages in hardback
One good thing: For those who have read all the Mitford novels, this is like catching up with old friends during the holidays. Reading it is like sitting down for an episode of Gilmore Girls. It is heartwarming without being too saccharine because Karon makes sure that there are enough realistic problems that her characters deal with that are never completely solved (just like in real life). But they make progress in solving them.
One not-so-great thing: Even though I have read all the Mitford novels, it has been a while since the last one. I had trouble remembering who many of the "side" characters were and what problems they were dealing with. Karon gives some background without resorting to a lot of exposition but I wonder if someone who just picked up this novel without reading the earlier novels would be lost.
Nancy Pearl's "Four Doorways":
Story: As usual in a Mitford novel, the incident that instigates the plot is very mundane and isn't of the type that moves a story along. It is mostly a device to move the story between characters. This is not a page turner by any means.
Characters: There are a multitude of characters, most of them introduced in previous novels. Karon is very good at giving each character an individual "voice" that I find easy to hear in my mind. But even if you like character-driven stories that meander through plots you may be frustrated unless you started with the first book in the series. This book was clearly written with existing fans in mind.
Setting: While I think many people read the Mitford novels for the characters I'm convinced most people read them for the setting. While Karon doesn't shy away from showing that rural America has many problems, Mitford is the small town that everyone who ever dreamed of living in a small town wants to move to.
Writing: Nobody buys the Mitford novels for the writing itself but Karon is very good at dialog. And her descriptions of food will make you hungry. (By the way, OMC stands for Orange Marmalade Cake, which should be avoided by anyone diabetic!)
