Rating:  Summary: Boring, repetitive, just skip it! Review: I was looking for a book that would help with the Christmas spirit outside of the material aspects we get hung up on. Maybe the end of this book does that, but the majority of the book is just plain boring. So they decide to skip Christmas. Fine. But it just drags on, and on.Best to just skip the time it takes to read this book and go for a walk in the woods and think about what Christmas means to you.
Rating:  Summary: a Capra-esque classic Review: If Frank Capra wrote a book about Christmas, I doubt he could have done a better job than John Grisham has in his "Skipping Christmas." It is a story about many things: about family, commercialism, the pressures and joys of community, and the true meaning of Christmas. The story centers on an idea the main character, Luther Krank, has. With his daughter finally out of the nest and with the realization that he spent nine percent of his adjusted gross on Christmas the year before, Luther decides to "skip" Christmas. For Luther (and his wife Nora) "skipping Christmas" means: not presents, no tree, no buying gifts, no decorating, no office parties, and on the day after Christmas--a big fat cruise in the Caribbean. Only, Luther and Nora do not find extricating themselves from Christmas as easy as it would seem to be on the surface. The rest of the book tells of their adventures in trying to skip Christmas. And as with all great Christmas stories, the ending is wonderful. I give skipping Christmas my highest recommendation.
Rating:  Summary: Grisham at his worst! Review: I am not a big John Grisham fan to begin with, but thought I would give this one a try because it wasn't his usual legal focus. What a waste of time and money! This book was dull, dull, dull. Grisham should definetly stick to legal writing. He has no business trying to write a "cute" Christmas story.
Rating:  Summary: A delightful read Review: This was an excellent novella. I am not normally a Grisham fan so this was a very delightful quick read. A great book not just for the holidays but year round. If after you finished reading this and you don't appreciate the people in your life more, read it again!
Rating:  Summary: Christmas Fun Review: Get the fire satrted, throw a few chestnuts on and read this little novella next to it. It's fun, fast and gets you into the Christmas spirit.
Rating:  Summary: A New Christmas Classic! Review: As much fun as Skipping Christmas is to read, it's even more fun to read the second time! Knowing what happens just sharpened my enjoyment of the book's beginning. I look forward to rereading this book every Christmas. I also hope that a movie will be made of it. Luther Krank is an inspired comic character. He and his wife, Nora, will remind you of Jackie Gleason and Alice Meadows in The Honeymooners. In his younger days, Jack Lemmon would have been perfect for the part of Luther. Like all great Christmas tales, this one teaches new dimensions of the real spirit of Christmas while taking aim at the humbug that tends to grow up around the edges in our celebration of this important Christian holiday. Is Christmas just for the children? Or is it for the child in all of us? How do you know when you've had a wonderful Christmas? How can you prepare to have a better one? Reading this book will undoubtedly give you some good ideas of where old habits need to be amended, and better ways of celebrating begun.
Rating:  Summary: Skipping Christmas in Suburban USA, how hilarious! Review: Imagine how neighbors, family and friends would react to this unheard of notion. How can this couple, the Krank's, just skip Christmas? Powered by Mr. Krank's spreadsheet analysis from last season, this couple is determined to skip all the gifts, the decorating, the tree, etc. To what lengths will their neighbors go to try and press this scrooge couple into the annual frenzy! A hilarious camaraderie ensues with characters so real, I am sure they walked out of Neighborhood USA and onto these 177 pages. The true spirit of the season, the spirit of giving and love, has the final say in Grisham's first Christmas novel. I plan to read this book every year just before the holiday frenzy begins, to remind me, I wouldnt skip the madness for anything!
Rating:  Summary: Want to be depressed for Christmas? Read this book Review: Yes, Virginia, it does end happily, sort of, but Skipping Christmas is smug, cynical, repetative and derivative, all wrapped up in one easy to wrap package, just like a lump of coal.
The characters aren't particularly sympathetic--they aren't even truly awful like Scrooge--they just sort of whine and complain. Some of the points are good, but we already knew that, and the pseudo-redemption at the last is too little, too late. Skip this book.
Rating:  Summary: Good Old Scrooge Review: John Grisham's Skipping Christmas is not a very original Christmas tale; it mixes and blends the best elements of The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and A Christmas Carol together to offer us a modern-day tale about the joys and meaning of Christmas. Sure, the book is at time a bit repetitive and it feels a little recycled, but it's good harmless fun nonetheless. Luther Krank has decided to skip Christmas this year. There will be no celebrating, no tree, no presents, no fruit cakes, no decorations. Instead, he will save the money he usually spends of such things and go on a cruise with his wife. And why? Because he feels a little depressed since his only daughter is gone to Peru on a Corps mission and will not be back for Christmas. Of course, the people around the Krank house feel a little irritated that Krank would refuse to participate in the celebrations. But of course, they will all come together in the end because this is Christmas, a time of giving and a time of loving. The book is very short and often funny. I found myself smiling more than once. This will not become a Christmas classic like A Christmas Carol or The Christmas Box, but it is still a fun read that I will want to come back to every year as Christmas comes closer and closer. Had the book been longer, than I might not have felt the same way. But coming in at a trim 177 pages, the story is a very quick and very entertaining read. A book that will surely put you in the Christmas spirit!
Rating:  Summary: They did what a lot of us have only been thinking! Review: Grisham set the scenario that goes through our heads when the spirit of Christmas goes out the window during the big rush. A cruise would be the easy way out! Full of comedy yet heartwarming. A refreshing change from his courtroom dramas.
|