A Cozy Christmas Read

The blurb on the back of my Christmas novel CHRISTMAS AT CASTLEDARRA says:

Molly O'Neil is looking forward to a family Christmas at Castledarra. It will be the first time for a number of years that everyone is at home for the festivities. She has some important things to tell them but little does she know that her three children are all at a crossroads in their lives.

The idea for this story came to me some time in the Spring of this year. We all have such high expectations of Christmas or indeed of any major family gathering. Yet we forget that our relatives and friends come to these events with very different feelings. There is a theory that all that advertising of happy faces and close families causes disappointments to spill over into family rows. The beaming faces of the people sitting around the dining table with the perfect meal in front of them and the adorable children hugging everybody do not mirror reality, at least for some families. Aunt Mary is soon going to start complaining about the noisy children, mother-in-law is going to sigh over the undercooked vegetables, sister or brother is going to roll their eyes at their sibling's behaviour. After a couple of glasses of wine, the Christmas spirit will have disappeared up the chimney.

Now, I don't want to be a spoiler, but people are only human, aren't they?  If we realised this, we might not take it all so seriously. The more tolerant families simply laugh at the eccentricities of the other family members. More importantly, it doesn't have to be perfect. The decorations, the Christmas dinner, the whole thing need not look like an advertisement. The most fun I have had in past seasons was one Christmas Day when the electricity went off. No lighting, no cooking. Fortunately, like so many people, I had a huge stock of food bought in and we all had great fun making sandwiches and making do. It brought everyone closer together. And the kids were more than relieved at not having to eat that Christmas staple in many homes: the Brussels sprout.

So this year, decorate by all means and cook the traditional turkey and ham and serve up Christmas pudding or whatever the usual fare is, but don't forget to relax, take time to laugh and more especially, more time to chat to family members who you haven't seen for a while. The festive season should be a people time not a present-giving, eating spree.