John Grisham, Skipping Christmas

Skipping Christmas

John Grisham

Bantam, Oct 26 2010, $7.99

ISBN: 9780440422969

After celebrating Christmas for years with their daughter, Luther and Nora Krank decide a holiday change is what they ought to do while their offspring is serving in South America with the Peace Corps. Neither of the Kranks particularly enjoys the holidays due to crassness and the frenzies of late shopping amidst a horde. They agree to Skipping Christmas this year by going on ten day cruise with the money they didn't spend on the holiday.

They ignore charities and their neighbors who insist the lights and Frosty must go up. This year, they will be dining on a luxury ship rather than hosting a gala as they have done for years. However, the Kranks are about to learn an American lesson when it comes to Skipping Christmas as plans of mice and bah humbugs often go astray in late December.

This is a lighthearted entertaining reprint of John Grisham's satirizing a capitalist Christmas. The story line is fun, but not anywhere near the excitement of the author's legal thrillers. Still with a eggnog nod to It's A Wonderful Life, fans who enjoy a warm holiday stocking yarn will want to learn how hard it is to simply skip Christmas.

Harriet Klausner

Imagine a year without Christmas. No crowded malls, no corny office parties, no fruitcakes, no unwanted presents. That's just what Luther and Nora Krank have in mind when they decide that, just this once, they'll skip the holiday altogether. Theirs will be the only house on Hemlock Street without a rooftop Frosty; they won't be hosting their annual Christmas Eve bash; they aren't even going to have a tree. They won't need one, because come December 25 they're setting sail on a Caribbean cruise. But, as this weary couple is about to discover, skipping Christmas brings enormous consequences--and isn't half as easy as they'd imagined.

I was a little shocked when I first began reading the book Skipping Christmas by John Grisham. It was nothing like what I had expected. It was nothing like what I had ever read from John Grisham before. I almost put the book down after the first couple of chapters. What a mistake that would have been!!!

I am truly glad that I continued reading. Soon I couldn't put it down. It was delightfully funny, warm, and witty. It was the kind of thing that we all think about doing (skipping Christmas), by Dec. 23,or 24th. I could vividly see all of the characters as the story unfolded. It is sure to be a clasic Christmas story. Like "A Christmas Story". I hope that they make a movie of it.

No it is not the typical Grisham. It was not what I was expecting, but, I would definitely recommend it, and Have.

Meet Luther and Nora Krank. A typical family heading for a typical Christmas until they decide to do something a little atypical. When they realise how much they spend every year at Christmas (and with their only daughter Blair away for the first year) they decide instead to spend their money on a special holiday-a dream cruise departing on Christmas Day. So they strike up an agreement: neither one of them is to spend so much as a penny on anything to do with Christmas.

Can the Kranks withstand the temptations and 'traditions' of Christmas? As the day approaches, the combined marketing might of brand names, shopping malls, neighbours and even friends combine to force these modern-day scrooges to succumb to the 'joys' of a modern Christmas. With the finishing line in sight, one phone call changes everything