Submit your book suggestions ... and Christmas party details

It was decided at our last meeting that we'd have a Christmas party just for the book club on December 13th, Sunday, at 17h00 at Isabelle's house in Beaulieu. We'll do a secret santa exchange, and names will be drawn for the game at our November meeting. (yay!) Even if you can't make the November meeting but do want to come to the December one, just send me that info via email and I'll make sure your name goes into the hat and that you get a name in return.

And now we're soliciting suggestions for a book for the Christmas party! Please make sure it's holiday-themed and very SHORT, since most of us will be very busy during the season.

So far we have 2 suggestions:

• Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" -- a classic British Christmas short story, and

• "Skipping Christmas" by John Grisham (also quite short, but not as short as the other.) There are no lawyers or major crime in this one...but it's quite a fun read. 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.