First published 2007
The holiday season arrives with its familiar mix of joy and dread. Gingerbread and chocolate treats appear everywhere, adding unwanted pounds to thighs. Christmas comes around once again with all its demands and expectations. The protagonist faces the annual cycle of good intentions about doing things differently this year. She wants to handle the festivities better, start earlier, or skip certain traditions entirely. But family obligations make these resolutions impossible to keep. The same patterns repeat as they do every year. The tension builds between personal desires and family expectations. At its heart, this story captures the bittersweet reality of holiday traditions that bind families together even as they create stress and compromise individual wishes.
Genres: family-life, humor, contemporary, holiday
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: bittersweet, family-drama, slice-of-life
Period: Holiday Season
141 pages · Paperback · Bastei Lübbe