What did I just read?
So I confess that I didn’t really read the blurb that closely, just saw Kristin Hannah, knew that I liked (and had downloaded) other stuff from her, and just needed something quickly because I had scores of doctor’s appointments and waiting rooms coming up.
But this was weird.
Like, SUPER weird.
Joy – a high school librarian – is a lover of all things Christmas, but this year, her first Christmas since her divorce (where her husband left her for her sister, who, by the way, is pregnant), she just can’t get in to it. She tries, even going to the tree lot the day school gets out to buy a tree, but on the way home, detours to the airport and buys a ticket to nowheresville in the Pacific Northwest. The only flight she can get is on a charter, and she snags it before she changes her mind.
And then the plane crashes, and once she comes to on the forest floor, she realizes that nobody knows she was on that plane, so she can just…disappear. She walks, for miles, until she comes to an old run down inn, where she’s admitted to a room by the proprietor’s young son Bobby.
What follows is a series of conversations and adventures with Bobby and his dad Daniel, who just moved back to the inn to prepare it to sell after Bobby’s mother – and Daniel’s ex-wife – died in October. Joy WILDLY oversteps her bounds here – decorating the inn with Bobby, encouraging Bobby to talk to his dead mother, interferring between Daniel and Bobby – but I just chalked it up to Hannah’s writing and didn’t really think anything of it.
And then all of a sudden, the story takes a turn and we discover that NONE OF THAT IS REAL. Not Bobby, not Daniel, not the inn, none of it.
Turns out, Joy never regained consciousness after the plane crash and has been in a coma. Bobby’s a dream. So is hot but sullen and sad Daniel. So is the inn, which I have to say felt like maybe had a mold problem what with all the moss growing everywhere. So we’ve got an “I see dead people” situation going on here once Joy awakens, and she’s afraid people will think she’s a bit nutty. Which: fair.
But then, Joy goes on a hunt to see if Bobby and Daniel really exist. (Spoiler: they don’t. Cause it was a coma-dream.)
And then she forgives her sister FOR SLEEPING WITH HER HUSBAND and plans to attend their upcoming nuptials. And I’m assuming the baby shower, too.
The end.
No, Kristin. Just: no.
