Review of The Christmas Plains By Joseph Bottum

The Christmas Plains by Joseph Bottum is a sheer joy to read. It was a pleasure from the first page to the last. Mr. Bottum takes a collection of stories and makes them shine. Through his collection of short stories we get to meet some of the people who lived without all of the conveniences we have today, yet still lived sometimes wonderful, sometimes unbelievably hard, horrible lives.One of the stories is about a young couple living on a ranch. Just as a blizzard hits the Plains their furnace breaks down and their baby gets sick. They have to make a decision that will either save all of them or none of them. While the author's great-aunt is telling the story he is wondering why she is telling him this story. The couple with their baby set off during the blizzard to get their child to safety even though the nearest doctor was about 50 miles away. It took them 5 hours to get there. The author's great-aunt went on to explain that parents will do anything for their child. He begins to think about the words, parent, child, child, God. The birth of Jesus and what Christmas really means. He writes about the all of the wonderful books he gets at Christmas and he even writes about the delicious food. The stories tell about his childhood, Christmas memories and those memories  which his daughter is now receiving. Through all of these stories he brings us through we begin to realize that the true meaning of Christmas is, all of our memories wrapped together, even the simplest of all of them. I was given this book for free by the Waterbrook Multnomah Publishing Company. If you would like more information about this book you can find it here, http://www.randomhouse.com/book/221642/the-Christmas-Plains-by-Joseph-Bottum.  Sometimes readers like to read the first chapter in a book or want to know more about the author. This can be found at http://www.scribd.com/doc/102278678/the-christmas-plains-by-Joseph-Bottum-excerpt   and http://www.randomhouse.com/book/221642/the-christmas-plains-by-joseph-bottum#abouttheauthor .  This is a wonderful book to read at Christmas, even when it isn't Christmas.