The Christmas Wish by Lindsey Kelk

I have been a fan of Lindsey Kelk since I first picked up I Heart Christmas, the sixth of her I Heart series featuring the character of Angela Clark. It was clear that Lindsey was a Christmas fanatic like me, and I smiled and laughed throughout as Angela’s Christmas mania reflected my own but exaggerated of course! I went back through the series, not always in order, and absolutely loved them. Once I saw that her new book was called The Christmas Wish I instantly ordered it and waited impatiently for publication day. Was it worth the wait? Well, read on!

The Plot

The book features Gwen Baker, a lawyer at a crossroads, whose professional and personal lives seem to be heading in one direction only, downwards. As usual, she is heading for her childhood home in Derbyshire to spend Christmas with her parents. The family know that she has finished with her boyfriend, a dentist who has, rather unimaginatively as the family point out, finished with Gwen and moved in with his receptionist! What they don’t know is that she is faced with losing her job at a prestigious law firm after attacking a client. It is a job she hates, but she has never told her family, especially her father whose dream it was for her to become a top lawyer. Gwen is hoping to get through the visit without admitting to this, but unfortunately her boorish brother-in-law has found out about the situation and told Cerys, Gwen’s sister. It’s like a ticking time bomb, and when it goes off, on Christmas Day itself, there are literal and metaphorical fireworks. Gwen goes to sleep that night, wondering how to fix things with her dad. The following day, however, isn’t the following day, it’s Christmas Day again. In an inversion of Wizzard’s classic song, Gwen must find a way to make sure that she escapes whatever is causing this, because she really wishes it wouldn’t be Christmas every day!

The story, the characters and the feelings

One of the cleverest things that Lindsey Kelk does is to get Groundhog Day out of the way very early on, when her adoptive brother and best friend, Manny, mentions it. Obviously, Groundhog Day itself is in a long line of events repeating themselves, but it is definitely the cultural touchstone that would otherwise remain in the back of our minds. Next, the spectre of repetition is also dealt with early on as Gwen decides that to get out of this situation, she must need to solve the problems of someone in the family. Once the idea of repeated Christmas Days is out of the way, every Christmas Day is different to the extent that common events are only mentioned in passing as the story takes hold.

Gwen is a thoroughly sympathetic heroine, albeit one with significant faults and failings which have put her in this position. She is grounded in reality but has that clear air of a Hallmark movie protagonist! Her increasingly desperate attempts to find the key to her problem show up a number of less positive elements of her character, but these are more than outweighed by the positive. Her family are very well drawn, moving from the surface characters we see in that first Christmas Day to complex individuals whose behaviour is often grounded in fear, regret and social expectations. Cerys in particular becomes far more understandable as we dig beneath the surface of her behaviour, and by the end she is a person I really warmed to. The central trio are Gwen, Manny and childhood friend Dev, now a very successful surgeon. Gwen learns more about them as every Christmas Day goes past, but they of course don’t remember the previous meetings and conversations. Interestingly, Gwen uses the things she’s learnt sparingly and, generally, as carefully as possible. She learns that Dev, who she always had a massive crush on, reciprocated that crush but neither of them admitted it to each other. The way that their relationship fizzled out over e-mail is true to life and will cause some people to think of their own failed friendships. The walk to Chatsworth House is one of the comic high points of the novel as the two friends revert to daredevil teenagers without really intending to. One more Christmas Day that was really well handled was the one where she tries to talk to Michael, her former boyfriend. It cleverly dissects a relationship break up that is not as clear cut as it seems.

This book just fills you with Christmas spirit when you read it. However, that Christmas spirit doesn’t have the overpowering, cloying sweetness of Bailey’s, more the sometimes-bitter edge of a mulled wine. It reflects family Christmases as they are with all their frustrations and irritations, but also with all the warmth, friendliness and togetherness that they contain. This is such a skilfully written book with brilliant comic set pieces, warmth and sympathy for all the characters and steeped in the traditions and feelings of Christmas. I loved every minute of the book and raced through it. Very unusually I am intending to read it again during December this year. It is the Last Christmas or Merry Christmas Everybody of Christmas novels – an instant classic!