Trust me, you’ll love this opportunity to scoop up new titles, classics, new to you books, and more! Follow me on BOOKBUB and you’ll not only be alerted when my books are offered at low and FREE promo prices, but you can select categories and follow your other favorite authors. You’ll always be in the know about great deals in the book world. And speaking of deals… if you haven’t started reading my Letter Series books yet, the boxed set of books 1-3 is FREE for a short time. Get yours now!

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The post The Christmas Coat is FREE! appeared first on Kathleen Shoop.

Jacob Gusky wakes up hoping Santa has arrived. And he has… but not for Jacob, one of two Jewish boys living at the Boys’ Home of Manhattan. When a friend gifts him a tin whistle, Jacob learns the power of giving, the joy in receiving, and hears what he considers to be the sound of happiness.

1881

Recently widowed and completely out of options, Frannie takes her daughter Molly to the Home for the Friendless. “You’ll be back before Christmas?” Molly asks. Frannie gives Molly half a quilt square and keeps the other, choking on her reply.

Now a happily married father of three, Jacob Gusky owns Gusky’s Grand Emporium, Pittsburgh’s first premier department store. After unearthing the tin whistle from the orphanage, he is reminded of what it felt like to have nothing, and decides to make a difference in the lives of others no matter their faith. But with so little time before Christmas morning, can he even begin to give the orphaned children of Pittsburgh what he knows they need?

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Two days before Christmas, ornery Elliot Ebberts is tasked with school drop-off. Distracted by an important real estate transaction, he’s short on holiday happiness. Snarled by carpool chaos his extravagant, lucky coat goes missing. In a panic, he starts his search, tracing the coat’s path as it passes through the hands of good people in dire situations.

Meanwhile, his plan to WOW his wife Libby with an ostentatious gift reveals Elliot’s shallowness to the world and mortifies his entire family. Is it too late for him to rediscover the meaning of Christmas, to remember who he is without all the trappings of the job that defines him? Can Libby and their children ever forgive him?

Interested in a short, sweet Christmas story? The Christmas Coat is free, it’s fun, and available in ebook, audio, and print! Check it out.

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I love the article linked here because it brings to life the past and also reflects reality over fantasy. There are ideal decors, decorations, trees and festivities we all associate with Christmas. In our minds we recall the highest fashion, the best of all that can be, but the photos below reflect real life way back when, when trees were spindly and only sometimes did they look like perfection.

But really, for the families involved, I’m sure each one was its own version of prefect.

(Black and white photo from article)

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The post Strongman and the Mermaid–Dresses appeared first on Kathleen Shoop.

Need to show the inner workings of an established family unit and how their decisions impact newcomers? Invite them to Shrove Tuesday! Shrove Tuesday (also Shrove Thursday THROUGH Tuesday), Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday, and Pancake Day are all differently named traditions that mark the beginning of Lent–a time for quiet reflection and plain eating. 

The second reason I am using traditions in my books is because when families moved to America from foreign lands they often flocked to areas of the country and cities where there were others from their homeland. 

These clusters of Poles and Slavs, Italians and more were in search of the American Dream but they held tight to the rituals and beliefs that created an immediate sense of belonging in a new place. 

I can’t imagine Strongman without these traditions as not only did they lend drama and weight to the book, they give it the authenticity that readers are looking for when they pick up historical fiction. Hope you’re having a wonderful day celebrating in whatever way you like! Fill us in on your traditions!

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According to Mrs. Sharp’s Traditions: Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations of Comfort & Joy (S.B. Breathnach), Valentine cards “…were among the few tokens that could freely be exchanged between men and women, and much was read between the lines, or in this instance, the hearts and flowers.” Breathnach goes on to discuss the way the degree of elaborate decorations on the cards illustrated the depths of a person’s love for the recipient. The more stuff on a card, the more promising the love.

Things have changed since the coy, secretive Victorian days… Now, overt acts illustrating attraction and desire (special underwear, racy text messages, mutual… well, you get it…) are more likely displayed or sent than a card with hidden messaging.

There’s nothing like the blush of new love. The excitement it brings is perfect for this red-hot holiday. Dr. Seuss said “You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.” That sums up new love perfectly, when as long as a pair is together, nothing else matters. Oh, those days. Can’t you just call up the feeling if you shut your eyes and imagine… Or maybe you’re in the throes of new love now. Oh, those days.

The length of time this exciting stage lasts is different for everyone, but it’s possible for couples to continue to recognize the truth in that statement even as time marches on, sagging our skin, bloating our schedules, and challenging everything that makes early love wonderful. Continuing to see that reality with lover A (or husband 2 and wife 3) is better than some dream, takes a little more consideration after years of being together. Perhaps each person has to play out in his or her mind what it would be like to live without the other. Time together requires many couples to really imagine it, to envision never sharing life’s developments, good and bad, small and large ever again, in order to remind themselves, that though love is different decades later, it’s even richer. Or not…

Let’s face it, many people need the thrill of never-ending newness and discovery. They aren’t alive if their heart isn’t thumping, spurred by thoughts of the next time they’ll see the current, budding love of their life. If that’s you, then perhaps serial monogamy is your ticket. Everyone is different so it’s best to know thyself and tread through love accordingly.

Here’s one take on ripened relationships: Marcel Proust on love:“When you come to live with a woman, you will soon cease to see anything of what made you love; though it is true that the two sundered elements can be reunited by jealousy.” Good old jealousy to the rescue. It does fire things up, doesn’t it?

This is my favorite… Julian Barnes: “Some of the freckles I once loved are now closer to liver spots. But it’s still the eyes we look at, isn’t it? That’s where we found the other person, and find them still.” Oh, the eyes… the way someone looks at his love… so many stories held in just one gaze, in just that way you’ve come to feel known and loved.

And then there’s Katherine Lee Bates: “Old love is gold love, old love, the best.”

No matter which stage you fall into or how you view it, if you’re with someone, wish them a happy Valentine’s Day in just the way that would be meaningful to him or her. Is that a lavishly decorated card, ala secret Victorian messaging? Or maybe it’s the seemingly mundane act of doing the dishes or putting the kids to bed for your wife or husband. Or maybe the two of you require full blown, crazy romance? Any way it works for a couple is the way to go on this long-lived, much loved by some and hated by others, holiday.

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