by Judy Duarte

This was a Christmas read I picked up at Goodwill recently that I took a chance on. Have you ever taken a chance on a book? I don’t completely regret it, but it didn’t live up to my expectation for it. I gave this one 3 but would have really given it 3.5 stars.

Its a week or two before Christmas and we meet Carly and her sons Mikey and Josh. Carly is a single mom who works as a hairdresser and is fighting every day to make ends meet. She has multiple past due envelopes and threats about eviction and repossession of her car. Mikey and Josh encounter this dog who likes to escape, Hemingway. His owner, Max, is a semi-retired probation officer on leave to write a novel and is a kind of grump.

Mikey and Josh sort of grow on Max and Max befriends Carly, but it starts to get to be something more than that. Meanwhile, there are other neighbors around that stories intertwine with Max and Carly. This story is of the starts of love at Christmas time with the magic and romance of the season but also draws in a Christian reader.

The problem with the craft of tying Christian roots is, it should have been introduced from the very beginning. I was shocked and taken aback when it just appeared out of nowhere. It seemed random and unplanned. It was cute and an easy read, but seemed a little disorganized at times.

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