Nora Bonesteel's Christmas Past: A Ballad Novella by Sharyn McCrumb, © 2014

    ~* there is more to this world than the eye can see,

                                                        especially at Christmastime *~

New York Times best-selling author Sharyn McCrumb returns with a new Ballad novella, featuring fan favorite characters Nora Bonesteel and Spencer Arrowood. Available everywhere October 2014 ~ releases October 7 from Abingdon Press. Ready for order.

When someone buys the old Honeycutt house, Nora Bonesteel is glad to see some life brought back to the old mansion, even if it is by summer people. But when they decide to stay through Christmas, they find more than old memories in the walls.
    On Christmas Eve, Sheriff Spencer Arrowood and Deputy Joe LeDonne find themselves on an unwelcome call to arrest an elderly man for a minor offense. As they attempt to do their duty, while doing the right thing for a neighbor, it begins to look like they may all spend Christmas away from home. In a story of spirits, memories, and angels unaware, Sharyn McCrumb revisits her most loved characters who know there is more to this world than the eye can see, especially at Christmastime.

Christmas Past never came! Or is it on the way? Memories, though fleeting, may just be knocking on the door ~ or on the Christmas tree of the new winter occupants. A summer holiday turns into a winter retreat as the owners decide to stay to see a white landscape without and a warming fire within. The last snowy adventures were by prior long-time owners, the Honeycutts. When Nora Bonesteel visits, things become clear.

Sheriff Spencer Arrowood and his sidekick, Deputy Joe LeDonne, find more than they bargained for when they venture deep in the faraway woods to bring back a fugitive of the law. Putting in a little physical labor before securing their intended respondent, humor abounds in this story. A surprise outcome to their visit has them scratching their heads.

Both stories within a story are woven together as Sharyn McCrumb features her beloved characters. You will be amazed at the sleuth involved. A Christmas-time story of hope and caring.

Christmas is such a wonderful time of the year, to gather with family and friends around a warm fireplace and drink some hot cocoa, to celebrate all that is good, and to remember those who cannot be home with us this Christmas.

                                                              Merry Christmas.

Sharyn McCrumb is an award-winning Southern writer, best known for her Appalachian "Ballad" novels, including the New York Times best-sellers The Ballad of Tom Dooley, The Ballad of Frankie Silver, and Ghost Riders. Nora Bonesteel's Christmas Past is McCrumb's first Ballad Christmas novella.
   Recognized with several awards, McCrumb was recently named a Virginia Woman of History by the Library of Virginia, and in 2014 she was awarded the Mary Hobson Literary Prize for Southern Literature.
   McCrumb has presented programs and workshops at universities, libraries, and other organizations throughout the United States and abroad. She lives and writes in the Virginia Blue Ridge, less than a hundred miles from where her family settled in 1790 in the Smoky Mountains that divide North Carolina and Tennessee. Her great-grandfathers were circuit preachers in North Carolina's Smoky Mountains a hundred years ago, riding horseback over the ridges to preach in a different community each week. It is from them, she says, that she gets her regard for books, her gift of storytelling and public speaking, and her love of the Appalachian Mountains. Visit her online at SharynMcCrumb.com.

~* one g~i~v~e~a~w~a~y copy! *~

***Thank you to PR by the Book for this review copy and the offer of a giveaway hardcover copy of Sharyn McCrumb's Nora Bonesteel's Christmas Past: A Ballad Novella to one commenter. Leave a contact e-mail address with your comment, ...[at]...[dot]com. Giveaway will be drawn on October 16, 2014 [Continental U.S. only due to mailing postage]. Winner will be contacted by e-mail. This review was written in my own words. No other compensation was received.***