What are we talking about today?

I'll get back to theme days once I find a groove of posting regularly. In the meantime, most of my posts are about some variation of books, bikes, buses, or Broadway. Plus bits about writing, nonprofits, and grief from time to time.

This blog is mostly lighthearted and pretty silly. It's not about the terrible things happening in the world, but please know that I'm not ignoring those things. I just generally don't write about them here.

17 December 2010

More Holiday Book Reviews

I don't usually look at the reviews on Amazon before buying things, because people put dumb stuff on the internet. But I did go back and look at the reviews for Stupid Christmas after I finished reading, and I gotta say: This book will not appeal to all senses of humour, and the reviews confirm that.

It's a collection of the dumb stuff people do around Christmas-- altercations with mall Santas, Nativity Scene thefts, burglary by people in Santa costumes, and other things that make the season bright. It wasn't bad, but not terribly funny, either. That is to say, I didn't laugh out loud, although I did snicker a few times.

This book is free on Amazon Kindle.

And now for the books I didn't finish.

I guessed by the title The Judge Who Stole Christmas what this book would be about, but I tried it anyway. I got as far as the judge ordering the live Nativity on the town courthouse lawn to stop and the man who was playing Joseph complaining, "I just can't believe that in the United States of America we can't even celebrate Christmas anymore," and I quit. I'm sure my ranting a few weeks ago already gave away how I feel about this, but I have no use for the "War on Christmas" people.

What's good about this book is that it's written by an actual lawyer, so the  court scenes are probably more accurate than in some Christian novels. If you like legal thrillers or the War on Christmas, or both, this book may be for you.

My Christmas Wish I didn't get as far in. I didn't look at the cover before I started reading, or I might not have started at all, because that picture pretty much gives it away.

Chapter 1 is from her perspective. It's not so bad. Actually, even though I'm only mildly interested in romantic stories, I was thinking I could pick up some writing tips for my NaNo novel which is, in theory, a romantic comedy. (A Christian romantic comedy, so I'll be avoiding what happened next.)

Chapter 2 is from his perspective, and I got through one page before closing it. The steamy, über-descriptive romances are not my thing. At. All. I'll find another way to describe the romantic scenes in my NaNo novel that doesn't include filling my imagination with X-rated images.

If you are into romances that are extremely descriptive, and Christmas-themed to boot, you might enjoy this. It is also available for free in the Kindle version.

**If you don't have the Kindle, you are not alone; I don't have one, either. I do have Kindle for PC, which means I can get books at the Kindle price and read on my laptop.**

8 comments:

Patricia A. Timms-McGehee said...

I didn't even know those books were out there until now. Thanks for the tips. I could probably get by with the first and last book but not the war on Christmas book.

Thanks for the tip on Google Chrome on my blog. It was great to hear from you. I've been locked away in the kitchen and haven't been out and about on the blogs lately. I plan to make up for it in the new year.

Happy Holidays!

Meredith McCardle said...

The Judge Who Stole Christmas book is already pissing me off, and all I've done is read the title and looked at the cover. Not for me!

Mary Mary said...

I think the only one I would really enjoy is Stupid Christmas. I love to read about the dumb things other people do, and think, I'm glad I'm not that ridiculous. I'm not much of a Christmas-book reader around the holidays. They all pretty much say similar things. I will say, though, that I'm a sucker for sappy Christmas movies!

♥ Mary Mary

Su said...

@Patricia: Just doing my part to spread the good cheer. :) Christmas baking is the best-- but I'm glad it's only for one season!

@Meredith: Yeah, I should have gone with my instincts on that one.

@Mary: Hee hee. That's pretty much how I feel about dumb stuff people do, too. And if not for the holiday reading challenge, I probably wouldn't have tried any of these-- but hey, I got one good read out of it! :)

Faith said...

Umm, well... I don't think any of those sound like my kind of book, but it was fun to read your post about them! Doesn't sound like there are enough laughs in 'Stupid Christmas' to make it worthwhile.

Su said...

No, not really. I won't be rereading it.

Felicity Grace Terry said...

Hmm, I was at first interested in the Stupid Christmas book but after reading your review .... probably not.

The second book about the judge who stole Christmas could be interesting though as we also have this whole thing about Christmas celebrations becoming 'Winter Festivals going on.

As for the third book? Going by the cover alone I wouldn't have picked this up.

Su said...

That's exactly what the Judge book is about. So if the subject interests you, then you'd probably like it more than I did. I've just heard too much about it over the last few years to want to read any more.

And yes, that would be my problem with buying the free Kindle books-- it's very easy to get them without considering the subject matter. Oops.