Customer Reviews

The Christmas Glass: A Novel

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In 1940 as Mussolini brings Italy into the European war on the side of Germany, the widow Anna runs a small orphanage that quietly has given shelter to Jewish children. Although she knows she is doing the right thing by allowing the Jews into her orphanage she has one regret. Anna fears the Fascists will destroy her family heirloom given to her by her mom, a dozen hand-blown Christmas ornaments, in retaliation for housing the Jews. Refusing to allow the kids to be kicked out, she carefully wraps the precious twelve and sends them to her married cousin Filomena, mother of twin toddlers. When the war ends, Filomena and her family leave Europe for America.

Over the decades, the glass ornaments are passed around the family so that twelve different people possess one each. In 2000 octogenarian Filomena fears her family has lost its way as nothing brings them together. As the matriarch and with a nod to Anna, Filomena demands the return of the twelve ornaments to be delivered in person by the family member possessing it. This will be a Thanksgiving to remember as a lovely reunion or the end of the tenuous ties.

This is an engaging family drama that feels relevant in today's shrinking world in which ironically extended families are moving further away from one another. The story line focuses a chapter each on the twelve possessors of the CHRISTMAS GLASS so that the readers learn what each person thinks with Filomena being the past owner. In some ways anecdotal rather than a linear plot, Marci Alborghetti provides a deep look at what denotes family just prior to the twenty-first century.

Harriet Klausner

There were some good things about this story and some that took away from it. For one, the author had a strong voice when she was showing you the relationships between characters. I enjoyed the conflict and found that to be realistic. The same goes for how she showed the decades of grudges and the matriach's desire to see her family connections restored. On the negative side there were a few too many characters whose point of view you had to be in and a lot of that was written in a telling format because there was not enough time to really show the characters developing. When the author did show the relationships and the conflict the book was compelling. When she told their invidual backgrounds it lost some of it's appeal. Also, the ending wasn't quite what I'd hoped. But overall I felt like it was a decent Christmas read. I didn't get any warm fuzzies, though. This story was uniquely done and you have to read it to see what I mean.

The Christmas Glass by Marci Alborghetti is a generational tale of family dysfunction and the power of Christmas. At the beginning of World War II in Italy, Anna regretfully packs away her family's collection of glass Christmas ornaments that have been passed from generation to generation. Afraid that they will be destroyed in the war, she sends them to her cousin Filomena in the hope that the collection will never be separated. Filomena takes the set to the United States with her husband and twin daughters and over the course of 55 years distributes the ornaments to people who touch their lives. Now she's over eighty and still interfering in her family's lives, blackmailing them together again for a Christmas meal before she'll move to a nursing home. Her meddling has caused a rift between the twins so great they haven't spoken in ten years. Alborghetti has a strong voice for portraying family dysfunction and pain. Every part of this family is facing trouble and heartache, but as Filomena and the Christmas Glass pull them together, wounds are healed. Those expecting a stereotypical saccharine-filled, heart-warming Christmas story will be disappointed. This story is far richer and deeper. It's a reminder that no matter how we struggle throughout the year, Christmas is a time that reminds us of the hope that Christ brought into the world through his birth.

I was so impressed with the beautiful way that the author intertwined important life lessons into a story that was captivating and heartwarming. I rarely purchase books, as my local public librarian can attest to, but I purchased several copies of this book to share with family and friends.

I see this book being something that all generations will enjoy and I am hoping that another book comes out of this story.

Marci Alborghetti accomplishes getting readers to spend their Christmas with this unique family and friends assembly. IT IS CHRISTMAS, NOT THANKSGIVING, but each in attendance at the contrived dinner have found a blessing to share. You will be left at the end of this tale recalling your own blessings and with a desire to pass along something to someone else--and it need not be an ornament of fine glass.

The history behind the volatile gathering deals with a 1940 decision to send a precious family-owned set of Christmas ornaments to a cousin, Filomena, who would soon escape war-time Italy and move to America. Mystic, Connecticut, actually. She was given the responsibility of protection for the glass. The book then skipped ahead to December, 2000, and Filomena devised a plan to force a reunion between her twin daughters by agreeing to move into the "dying building", as she calls the long-term care residence, if her daughters ate Christmas lunch with her, together, in her small apartment. Filomena would cook, likely spaghetti.

This was the beginning of chapters titled with the name of a person that had a significant influence on the life of Filomena. Some were family, others were strangers who became important, some were actually people connected to a descendant of Filomena. Most, in some way, had a connection to a certain piece of the Christmas Glass set. Over the years individual ornaments had been given away as mementos of special occasions/special people.

A once typical book content, now rare, is a list on the page prior to Chapter One containing all People mentioned in "The Christmas Glass." It identifies who they are, their relationship to Filomena, and their world location. "The Christmas Glass" offers a different way to serve up a plot to the Christmas Day dinner, Mystic destination, attended by several on the book's cast. As you read each chapter-story, they begin to intertwine more like a Filomena-magic-carpet than a tapestry. You feel you are among those arriving for the dinner, unknowing if it will be a time of forgiveness and blessings, or a time of chaos and strife, garnished with unsolved past differences.

Daniel said it best: "Sweetheart, you can't make everyone happy, and you can't be everyone's friend, especially when it comes to family." p53

Alborghetti keeps it believable, in that not all will become peaches and cream, or should we say, Christmas style 'sugar-plums and spice?' But you will be blessed by the wrapping up of Christmas for many members of this coterie. Your own Christmas, like almost all of "The Christmas Glass" characters, will be blessed, and likely in more than one way.

"The Christmas Glass" was this reviewer's first experience reading the author, Marci Alborghetti. But not the last!

Despite the title, this book is not just for Christmas time reading. It is unique in that the author presents each of its many characters in a chapter of its own and each chapter is a story within a story, blending them all together into a heart warming delightful whole. After I read the last line I found myself wanting to go back and start all over again at Chapter I.

I don't often find a story that immerses me as deeply THE CHRISTMAS GLASS by Marci Alborghetti. I was captivated from the very first pages. I was immediately enthralled by the story of Anna, in 1940's, war-torn Italy, wrapping her cherished hand-blown "Christmas glass" in scraps of her wedding gown to send to the safe keeping of her cousin Filomena. Filomena does over time award the precious, hand-blown ornaments to select family and friends. But, it's at a special Christmas meal gathering of holders of the cherished ornaments that you'll discover the part the "Christmas glass" plays in the healing power of this warm, yet honest story.

The Christmas Glass begins in 1940 with Anna, an Italian widow, sheltering a few Jewish children at her orphanage. Knowing the danger, Anna reminisces about her family's precious "Christmas glass," 12 beautiful hand-blown ornaments, as she wraps each piece to send to a cousin for safekeeping during the war.

Part I, above, was my favorite part of the book, only about 17 pages.

Part II, starting on page 23, begins in America in the year 2000. Ahh, if you've read any of my book reviews (thecreativesideofsteph DOT blogspot DOT com), you know contemporary settings are my least favorite! I would much rather have heard more about Anna or perhaps her cousin Filomena's immigration to America with the precious "Christmas glass" after the war.

Instead, the year 2000 brought with it too much angst and worldliness for me. While it is true that no one is perfect and we all have problems, Filomena's family is certainly more than dysfunctional, and I felt tense reading about each character.

Filomena has distributed each piece of the once treasured Christmas glass (which was never to be separated) to family and friends throughout the years. Now, nearing her final Christmas (or is it?), she manipulates them all to Connecticut, hoping to heal and restore some relationships.

Honestly, it was like when you hear someone's salvation testimony and all they do is talk about their former life and all the sin they were in. They spend 98.9% on their awful life and only 1.1% on the Lord. The characters and relationships were so crazy, and often hateful, that I winced as I read.

I really loved the idea behind the book...but, it didn't take the direction I was hoping for.

This is a beautiful book and was delivere in a most timely manner. Thanks.