Last week was a bit of a fast paced one for me so I wasn’t able to read what I planed, Tolkin’s Lord of the Rings but had to take on something smaller. I read John Grishman’s Skipping Christmas.

It’s a story about Luther and Nora Krank whose daughter Blair left after Thanksgiving for a one year mission for the Peace Corps in Peru. Because of that and the fact that they spent 6100$ on last Christmas (not the song :)) they decided to skip it this year. Skipping meant no presents, no tree, no lights, no nothing. The money the will save is going to be spent on a cruise in the Caribbean.

This decision turned out to have far more consequences then they had expected. All their neighbours started to decorate their houses and were puzzled by the fact that not a single light was places on the Krank’s house. Their street was competing in a “best decorated street” competition and the Krank’s might put everything in jeopardy this year if they proceed with it.

When they realised that they didn’t win (in fact weren’t even in the TOP 5) they started to “terrorize” the Kranks with Christmas carrolls and signs about how they didn’t put up a plastic snowman (a.k.a. Frosty) on their roof etc.

The Kranks had just one more day to endure when the unthinkable happened which turned everything upside down.

Skipping Christmas was a short but really good story about materialism and peoples obsession with everything regarding Christmas but the people they spend it with. Everything is just focus on food, decoration and other things you can buy with money but not the feelings you have while spending this time with the people you love.

I give this book a 10/10 because it perfectly describes the frenzy before Christmas which turns many people into monsters of a certain kind.

Hope to be able to finish LotR this week and see how Frodo and his friends come a little closer in saving the world

Until then, don’t forget to be awesome