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Under The Mistletoe Dear Reader, Christmas has always been my favorite holiday, celebrating as it does all that is finest in the human experience—love, generosity, peace, and joy. I am delighted that this volume makes available again four of my older novellas along with one new one. They are love stories in which Christmas is shown to have the power to heal all the wounds of the human heart. My new story, A Family Christmas, brings together a couple estranged since just after their arranged marriage the year before, and gives them the perfect chance to start over. In the classic stories, The Star of Bethlehem features one betrothal ring lost but three that are mysteriously found as a broken marriage is abundantly mended. The Best Gift is the tale of a teacher who has never known family, love or Christmas, but finds all three when asked to chaperon one of her pupils over the holiday. In Playing House a lonely aristocrat and his daughter are drawn to an impoverished young woman and her siblings, who are celebrating their last Christmas together with brave gaiety. An assortment of unhappy travelers stranded by bad weather at an inn on Christmas Eve encounter love after a young couple arrives to find that there is No Room at the Inn just as their child is about to be born. I hope you enjoy reading these stories as much as I did writing them. Happy Holidays! Mary Balogh
Signet, October 2006 |
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