Each of us could tell tales of at least 15 Christmases we or others have celebrated. We have been overjoyed or disappointed, alone or with family, loved ones, or friends, done all of the work to prepare for the holiday, some of the work, or none of the work, spent the season with people who make the days wonderful, frustrating or unbearable, celebrated with all of our hearts, or tried our best to ignore Christmas. In the real world, Christmas more often than not, isn't ideal. Maeve Binchy, the Irish author with millions of appreciative readers, has written a collection of stories which embraces the wide range of way Christmas touches people's lives. She doesn't present Christmas as a cure-all for her character's problems, but these stories do take into account that sometimes Christmas inspires people to do a little better, try a little harder and be a little kinder. Here is a sampling of the 15 short stories Binchy has written with insight, humor, sympathy and hope. After years of taking her exhausting Christmas preparations for granted, a woman thinks her family, are going to change their lazy ways. Though they continue to expect the world of her, she may have found a way to get their attention and motivate them to do more for her. A lonely teacher believes she has found love at last, at Christmas, but when he's unwrapped, he turns out not to be the gift she wanted. Another couple meet and fall in love at the fish market buying fish for Christmas dinner. After years of determination to snipe at and remain aloof from her stepmother, a teenager softens when she comes home from school and sees her room decorated for Christmas. A widow's loving grown children take the worry out of Christmas for there mother, and discover that without the fussing and worrying she doesn't have the heart to celebrate. On a long flight to Australia lonely strangers become friends as they nervously wonder if they'll be welcomed by their adult children. All through a Christmas visit a couple remain tolerant of the nasty remarks of an always critical mother until when it's almost time to leave, tempers boil over. A woman is reassured by tests in magazines and newspapers that her married lover is right for her until she takes a test on Christmas Day without him while he's with his family, with results that guarantee next Christmas will be different.
