Wednesday 22 August 2018

Skipping Christmas by John Grisham

This is another book that I read during my recent vacation. I found this book in the room I was staying in during my vacation.



All books of John Grisham that I have read so far have been legal dramas. This book came as a surprise to me as it was not one. When I picked up this book for reading, I did not know that and kept waiting for some event to unfold which would lead to a lawsuit but that never happened.

The book is about a couple Luther and Nora, whose only daughter of 18 years, Blair, moved to Peru on a humanitarian mission around Christmas time for a period of a year (I think). Luther and Nora decide to take a cruise during the Christmas break to the Caribbean. So, they decide to save up all the money that they would have otherwise spend on Christmas (parties, presents, cards etc) on the cruise and the preparation for the cruise. Now, they live in a close knit neighbourhood where Christmas is a big deal. Luther and Nora manage to fight their temptations to do anything Christmassy even at the expense of disappointing, if not offending, their neighbours. On Christmas eve, the day before the planned cruise, Blair calls and informs them that she will be home with her fiancé- a Peruvian doctor. The book then shortly dwells on the dilemma that Luther and Nora are in before moving on to what they do next. Read the book to know more :-).

The book serves as a reminder of what Christmas has become and what it is supposed to be. Grisham has attempted humour but it is not very funny, it would probably extract an occasional smile from the reader.

It is a small, simple book with very simple language, a quick read. I appreciate Grisham's attempt at something different. It was not his best book though. I like his legal drama much better. It is a good book to read just before Christmas, reading it in northern hemispherical summer probably did not have the same kind of effect. I rate this book 3/5.

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