Worth Reading – The Great Christmas Bowl by Susan May Warren

****Update: the winners of Susan May Warren’s novel, The Great Christmas Bowl, were chosen at random using www.random.org. We have notified each of the lucky recipients. Thanks to each of your for participating!

Susan May Warren is the award-winning author of seventeen novels and novellas with Tyndale, Steeple Hill and Barbour Publishing. Her first book, Happily Ever After won the American Fiction Christian Writers Book of the Year in 2003, and was a 2003 Christy Award finalist. In Sheep’s Clothing, a thriller set in Russia, was a 2006 Christy Award finalist and won the 2006 Inspirational Reader’s Choice award. A former missionary to Russia, Susan May Warren now writes Suspense/Romance and Chick Lit full time from her home in northern Minnesota.

A little about her new book The Great Christmas Bowl: 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? 

We’ve chosen The Great Christmas Bowl as our very first “Worth Reading” profile. How do you determine what’s “worth reading” within the vast array of Christian fiction out there?

That’s a great question!  I’m a tough reviewer, I’d admit.  A book has to hook my attention in the first chapter, plus have a heroine that is likeable and sympathetic.  I also want to  read a story that has a premise that touches my heart.  And the writing has to have some poetry to it.  I can usually tell if a novel is going to have these things within the first three chapters.  At the end of the day, the novel has to be worth my time in sitting down to read it – something that makes me ponder my life, my relationship with God, and makes me want to reach higher.

What made you decide to do 1) a Christmas book and 2) a Christmas book about football?

I think every author needs to have a signature “Christmas” story (much like a musical artist might have a Christmas album!).  Only, I wanted something unique and funny and heartwarming, and with a message that might appeal broadly.  Truthfully, I feel as if I received this story as a gift from God – it came fully packaged into my heart during a season when I saw my oldest son preparing to graduate and “leave the nest.”  I blubbered my way through that Christmas season, so much so that really, all I had to do was sit down and spill the story it onto the page.  In truth, I wrote it  as a gift to my family – football is a Warren passion, as well as our Christmas traditions, and I wanted something even  my boys would read.  (and I’ve had a lot of male readers who have endorsed it, also!)  My family’s gift to me was that they loved it.

I told you that there were many parts in this book that made me laugh out loud. Do you always incorporate humor into your books?

I try to.  I love to laugh – life is funny when we step back from it.  Even in stressful moments, there are funny elements that can help ease the tension.  So, I love writing books with humor sprinkled throughout.   My current series, the “Trouble” series about a wannabe Private Investigator is part humor, part suspense, part romance – okay, I think it’s the blend of a perfect book.  The Great Christmas Bowl is really an example of the daily life in the Warren household.

The story revolves around a mom who will do anything for her children. What is something you’ve done for your kids that you never expected to do?

I got involved in our small town theater (and yes, there may be a book about that someday!).  I have donned costumes as a Lions paw (Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe) and an eccentric church lady (the Worst Christmas Pageant ever) and spent hours backstage and running lines for their “theater” careers.  I also spend A-LOT more hours driving to football games than I ever imagined.  Yes, sometimes I am the lone mother in the stands at an away game, shivering in the rain, whoo-ha-ing my fullback or middle linebacker.  I also never thought I’d be the host of the prom party every year, but then again, at least I know where my teenagers are spending prom night!

Some parts of the book are derived from your real-life experiences. Care to tell us which ones?

Oh….well, it’s probably easier to detail which ones aren’t real.

I’ve never been a fish.

That’s it.

Oh, and we’ve never spent Christmas in Cancun.  (Yet).  But we have been to Cancun.  And spent Christmases in places all over the world.

The rest….well, times and places have been changed to protect the innocent (or guilty!)  Except for the dog.  Gracie deserves to be immortalized in the Library of Congress.

Finally, share a Warren family Christmas tradition.

Clam Chowder soup, of course!  We have it every year, along with fresh made buns (made by yours truly), and sandwich fixin’s.  We eat by candlelight, have a family devotional time, and then open ONE gift from under the tree (it’s always pajamas).  Then the kids (and grownups) get into their new jammies, and we do a family puzzle.  (a new one every year).    It’s something my family did growing up, and it’s been fun to continue the traditions.  I suspect my children will carry into their families, too.  Perhaps a new tradition will be me reading the Great Christmas Bowl aloud while we do the puzzle.  Hmmm…..I like that one.

Merry Christmas to all the Proverbs 31 women out there!  Have a fabulous season celebrating the gift of our Savior!

Susan May Warren

If you would  like to win a copy of The Great Christmas Bowl, just leave a comment below!  Three lucky winners will receive  TWO copies of Susan’s novel (one for you and one to give to a friend),  along with a copy of Catherine Palmer’s Victorian Christmas, a nostalgic collection of four novellas never before released in the same volume, and a pocket Bible Promises book all from Tyndale House Publishers.

Comment away, and good luck!!