The First Book of the Year 2023

Despite losing her parents in a tragic accident just before her fourteenth Christmas, Susan Norcross has had it better than most, with loving grandparents to raise her and a gang of quirky, devoted friends to support her. Now a successful bookstore owner in a tight-knit Michigan lakeside community, Susan is facing down forty—the same age as her mother when she died—and she can’t help but see everything she hasn’t achieved, including finding a love match of her own. To add to the pressure, everyone in her small town believes it’s Susan’s destiny to meet and marry a man dressed as Santa, just like her mother and grandmother before her. So it seems cosmically unfair that the man she makes an instant connection with at an annual Santa Run is lost in the crowd before she can get his name.

What follows is Susan and her friends’ hilarious and heartwarming search for the mystery Santa—covering twelve months of social media snafus, authors behaving badly and dating fails—as well as a poignant look at family, friendship and what defines a well-lived and well-loved life.

Why I Chose This One from My Shelf

I have been waiting to read it for awhile. I know its summer here, and in these hot summer nights I sure have a wish for winter! So some winter reading in the middle of summer seems just the thing. As well its Viola Shipman and I’ve enjoyed every other book I’ve read by this author. Therefore I expect to enjoy this one as well.

Happy New Year to you all. Wishing you a great 2023 in reading especially, but of course in every other way as well.