Title: The Christmas ShoppeAuthor: Melody Carlson
Genre/Audience: Christmas fiction, adult
Publication: 2011
Source: Library
Well, hello, Christmas season, you are early as ever! I don't usually start my Christmas reading quite this early, but this book was due, and I figured, what the hey? I'll read it now... the neighbors have pumpkins out still, and the other neighbors have Christmas decor already. Right now is choose your own holiday time, I guess. So, this is the first of many Christmas reads for me this season. Did I mention I love Christmas books? Well, not this one, so much...
Summary: Parrish Springs is a tiny town getting ready for Christmas. Things are going along as usual until the strange and eccentric Matilda Honeycutt moves to town and opens up a strange thrift store called The Christmas Shoppe. Many of the townsfolk want her and her shop gone, claiming the store and its unusual, used merchandise will hurt their own businesses on Main Street and detract from the ambiance and atmosphere of all the nice shops. Everyone's talking badly about Matilda and her strange ways, but she doesn't seem to mind. Matilda is adamant that the people look in her store to find "what they need," and though she struggles to get them in, those who do go in discover the true magic inside the store...
My Thoughts: I really, really loved the sound of this story. I love magic, especially Christmas magic, and I love small towns, buuut, this book didn't really work for me. I didn't dislike it, but it was just kind of "meh." It didn't feel Christmassy to me at all, aside from the fact that it was Thanksgiving time, and the store was called The Christmas Shoppe. I also didn't care for the characters. Matilda was eccentric and mysterious, which is cool, but we never see things from her point of view. The characters most predominantly featured, Tommy, the newspaper owner, and Susanna, the city manager, were both okay but kind of flat. They also changed their mind nonstop without any logical explanation - one minute they were rooting for Matilda, the next they were badmouthing her like everyone else. They were fickle and uninteresting, and though the book skimmed the surface of their pasts, it didn't delve in enough for me to really care or grow interested.
The shop had magical powers whose details I won't give away, but even that was kind of lame. When something magical happened, it would talk about it only very briefly, and the lives it affected each time were, again, hardly touched on. I think if this book had just focused on one main character and how their life changed, the story would have been infinitely better. The story really did have potential -I LOVE cheesy Christmas books - but it was too all over the place, and had too many characters to develop anyone's story well enough for me to be really invested.
My Rating: 2.5/5
So sad it didn't work for you. But thanks for your honesty :)
ReplyDeleteOh darn, I was hoping you would like this one. I can't get enough of Christmas-themed books, and am always looking for good ones. Since there are so many out there, I will skip this one -- thanks for the forewarning :)
ReplyDeleteI really love Christmas books too. I wish there were more really good ones out there. This one doesn't really sound like something I'd like though.
ReplyDeleteIt sucks that this didn't work out, cause it sounds cute. Although it sounds A LOT like Chocolat - a mysterious woman moves into a small town and opens a shop that half the community doesn't want and half loves. Chocolat was a pretty good book though.
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