6Dec |
Christmas Jars
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- ISBN13: 9781590384817
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
Keep some tissues on hand for this holiday story that is sure to be a Christmas classic! Where had it come from? Whose money was it? Was I to spend it? Save it? Pass it on to the someone more needy? Above all else, why was I chosen? Certainly there were others, countless others more needy than I…Her reporter’s intuition insisted that a remarkable story was on the verge of the front page. Rising newspaper reporter Hope Jensen uncovers the secret behin… More >>
First of all, I just have to ask, what’s the deal with people giving Christmas-related stuff to people for Christmas?
“An ornament! Thanks! I’m going to put it right on the tree…next year…I mean.”
“A two-foot-tall ceramic Christmas snowman! I’ll…um…well, I guess I’ll just set that…in the garage.”
“A book about Christmas that you heard about on some national radio show! I…I suppose I’ll read it.”
As founder of the Western Society of Old Time Jar Collectors, the President of Jars of New Mexico, and the owner of over 3500 historic (or just aesthetically pleasing) jars and jar tops, I was actually–all Christmas joking aside–ecstatic that finally, a book had come out to celebrate the wonder that is a jar. The glassy curves. The way the lid fits so perfectly onto the jar’s mouth. The way a child’s face lights up when given a jar of his or her very own. The thought of all that the jar has held in the past and may hold in the future. Peaches. Cherries. Strawberries. Onions. Coins. Sugar. Flour. Nuts. Bolts. Nails. Tomatoes. Wheat. Cat food.
A jar is a thing apart from this world. It’s a little haven. Outside, there are wars and natural disasters, but inside that little jar, everything is calm and quiet and safe, save for perhaps the last gasps of a little trapped weevil or silverfish.
Alas, however, despite this book’s title, it is not a guide to collecting the sassiest holiday-themed jars, nor is it the amusing tale of a lonely jar that must roll its way across the country to rejoin its family by Christmas Eve, accompanied on its quest only by two loyal dogs and a cat, one of which is voiced (at least in my mind) by Michael J. Fox.
No, this is the story of a newspaper reporter who finds out about a tradition of stuffing jars full of coins and bills and then giving them to someone in need around Christmas time; she then decides to investigate and write a story about it.
The book is actually touching, and somewhat original–I honestly kind of enjoyed it. It’s a very quick read, and can probably be read by most readers in under an hour. It’s trite fluff worth reading when you don’t want to read something that makes you think, though it’s sure to be a TV movie by next year if you just wait long enough.
The book’s faults though, are pretty numerous, too numerous to list them all here. I’ll just list two or three to give you an idea.
1. Its editors let quite a few typos slip through.
2. The book has NO SENSE OF PLACE. The book never says if it’s set in Phoenix, Arizona or Washington, D.C., or if it’s set in a big city or a small town. It never describes the setting at all, really, which was hugely distracting for me. It was if the author was ashamed of where the book was actually set, as if it would have humilated him to describe Las Cruces, New Mexico, or South Jordan, Utah, or as if it would have just been too much work or research.
3. This book put itself into a trap though of having its main character be a “great newspaper reporter,” because eventually this currently-shy-of-great writer, Jason Wright, has to write what a great newspaper reporter would write, and when he does…hmm. The article that whole story leads up to would make NO sense at all to someone who hadn’t read the book–it’s poorly written, unclear, unstructured, and unfocused. It reads like the work of a very bad small town reporter, and was even hard to read within the context of the book.
…Overall, the whole book really is sappy, and cheesy, but if you’re willing to endure some clunky writing, random sentences that really just don’t make sense, and the subtle feeling of wishing you were reading something else, then you may find a touching, even tearful story here, a story that, with a lot more editing, and a lot more work, could have been a holiday classic.
Rating: 2 / 5
This may well be the worst little Christmas book you will ever read. It’s based on the silly premise that jars of money, given with love, will change lives. The writing is unbelievably bad. (Richard Paul Evans doesn’t come close) Strangely, this book was loaned to me by the same friend who introduced me to “At the Manger” last Christmas, which I plan to re-read, now that I’ve gagged my way through this one.
Rating: 1 / 5
There really is a good story in here…. it just needed to be written by someone else.
The problem with this book is that the author takes so many “cheap shots” to tug at hour heart that it becomes OVERBEARING and OBNOXIOUS. There are ways to tug at someone’s heart without going so overboard that it becomes cheap and that’s exactly what it felt like to me when I was done reading this book. I was gagging so loud at the end that I almost woke the neighbors.
The only reason why I gave this book two instead of one star is because even with all the overbearing cheap shots it did make a good point to start your own jar.
Rating: 2 / 5
This story was a short, enjoyable read. Not great, but enjoyable.
Rating: 3 / 5
I have been a fan of Jason F. Wright’s writings ever since he first published in 1989. Christmas Jars is a great addittion to his set of writings. I am starting a writing campaign for his next book, The Top 10 Reasons You Should Never Take Your Hands Off The Steering Wheel While Driving In Mexico.
Rating: 5 / 5