Review and Tour: The Great Christmas Bowl by Susan May Warren

The Great Christmas Bowl: One Mother's Hilarious Quest to Serve Up the Perfect Holiday
by Susan May Warren
Tyndale House Publishers (August 17, 2009) ~ 176 pages
Fiction / General / Inspirational / Holiday

Edition Reviewed/Special Thanks: Paperback - Many thanks to the author, publisher, and publicists at the LitFuse Publicity Group for sending me this book to review!

Perfect for : Personal reading, Book club read, Great Christmas book!

In a nutshell: The Great Christmas Bowl is the perfect combination of football and holiday spirit, all rolled up in a nice little family and community. Kevin is the last of Mike and Marianne's offspring still living at home, and this year he is a senior on the football team. Marianne wants to make sure everything is simply perfect this year - from a great football season, to the perfect holiday season with the whole family. Little does she know, her life is about to take a turn. . . for the better??. . . as she is volunteered to lead the church's Hospitality Committee, and her son begs her to fill in as the football team's mascot (a huge trout) when Bud suffers a massive heart-attack. She somehow manages to keep life moving forward while trying to juggle her new duties, all the while learning what God's meaning of hospitality really is, and helping to rally the community and watch her son to grow as a man!

This is an absolutely wonderful book filled with holiday spirit and family. . . I would challenge anyone to read it and not add it to your "favorites" list. This heart-touching story will have you laughing and crying tears of joy, all while experiencing what the holidays are REALLY about. Be sure to add this book to your must-read holiday list this year! Susan May Warren has included a Clam Chowder recipe in the back of the book that sounds wonderful!

About the Book (from the LitFuse Book Tour):
Marianne Wallace is focused on two things this holiday season: planning the greatest family Christmas ever and cheering on her youngest son’s team in their bid for the state championship.

Disaster strikes when the team loses their mascot-the Trout. Is it going too far to ask her to don the costume? So what if her husband has also volunteered her to organize the church Christmas tea.

When football playoffs start ramping up, the Christmas tea starts falling apart. Then, one by one her children tell her they can’t come home for Christmas.

As life starts to unravel, will Marianne remember the true meaning of the holidays?

About the Author: (from the LitFuse Book Tour)
Susan May Warren is the RITA award-winning author of twenty-four novels with Tyndale, Barbour and Steeple Hill. A four-time Christy award finalist, a two-time RITA Finalist, she’s also a multi-winner of the Inspirational Readers Choice award, and the ACFW Book of the Year. Her larger than life characters and layered plots have won her acclaim with readers and reviewers alike. A seasoned women’s events and retreats speaker, she’s a popular writing teacher at conferences around the nation and the author of the beginning writer’s workbook: From the Inside-Out: discover, create and publish the novel in you!. She is also the founder of http://www.mybooktherapy.com/, a story-crafting service that helps authors discover their voice. Susan makes her home in northern Minnesota, where she is busy cheering on her two sons in football, and her daughter in local theater productions (and desperately missing her college-age son!) A full listing of her titles, reviews and awards can be found at: www.susanmaywarren.com

Link to Buy the Book:
http://www.christianbook.com/great-christmas-bowl-susan-warren/9781414326788/pd/326788?event=AFFp=&

The Great Christmas Bowl website: http://thegreatchristmasbowl.blogspot.com/
The website features a note from the author, fun updates from Big Lake Gazette, info on how to host your own Great Christmas Bowl Tea to benefit a local ministry or charity and a fun Recipe Exchange contest!

CONTEST: Be a part of the Great Christmas Bowl recipe exchange!
Susan loves getting recipes from friends, and sharing the delicious cookies, soups, breads and other fun fixings that go with celebrating the Christmas season. More than that, she loves the crazy stories about favorite Christmases – serious, touching, funny…whatever. Find the recipe contest here: http://thegreatchristmasbowl.blogspot.com/2009/07/recipe-exchange.html

Will you share your story and recipe with Susan and the readers of the Great Christmas Bowl? She will post your story and recipe on the FRONT PAGE of the Great Christmas Bowl website, and send you a link when it goes up so you can tell all your friends. Then, at the Great Christmas Bowl party (December 5th, 10am, online! Details TBA) she’ll make the entire cookbook available for download!

For every recipe/story you submit (up to 3), you will be entered in a drawing to receive one of SMW’s collections (Noble Legacy, Team Hope, Heirs of Anton, Deep Haven Series, Josey series, or THE ADVANCED COPY of Sons of Thunder – Susie’s brand new epic World War 2 novel, due out in January 2010!)

Go – run, get your recipe, then come back here and click on the link below to share your Christmas memories!

Blog Tour Schedule!
I hope you will take a minute to go to LitFuse and visit other tour stops by going here: http://www.litfusegroup.com/latest/current-blog-tours/91-the-great-christmas-bowl-blog-tour


If you have reviewed this book and would like me to add a link to your review, please include a link in your comment!