There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays - Softcover

9781576010532: There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1576010538 ISBN 13: 9781576010532

Publisher: Papier Mache Pr, 1997

A collection of family anecdotes, holiday recipes, and other writings recall the joys and frustrations of celebrating holidays

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From the Publisher:

Robert Frost said, "Home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you in." In a humorous departure from her bestselling anthologies on aging, Sandra Martz (editor of WHEN I AM AN OLD WOMAN I SHALL WEAR PURPLE) serves up the quintessential book about holidays and family. Authors aged 3 to 93 recall the chuckles, exasperation, tenderness, and belly laughs of traditional family get-togethers. This is "...a charming selection of stories, poems and anecdotes relating to the traditional holidays of Christmas, Passover and Thanksgiving." (Publishers Weekly) And we've included a generous helping of mouthwatering family recipes to top off those holiday memories.

"In her very fine collection of short holiday pieces, Sandra Haldeman Martz offers balm for the troubled holidays to come. The result is many laughs-and the heartening realization that there are holiday gatherings worse than your own." (San Francisco Bay Area Reporter)

"...each piece has flair, personality and humor. Get a copy and bring it out at your next celebration when the stomach is full, but the heart is till open for laughs and nurturing. It could become a tradition." (Independent Publisher)

From the Author:

Last December my husband and I packed our bags and headed to Yosemite to rendezvous with my in-laws for the holidays. We had reservations for a cozy two-bedroom cabin nestled under snow-covered pines. We'd decided against renting separate cabins since, according to the brochure, some had a fireplace. We pictured the four of us curled up in front of a shared fire, sipping a little Yuletide cheer.

Our first hint of trouble came when we noted the small cabin was marked with two cabin numbers. Entering the door on the left we found one 10 x 12 "two bed" room, a tiny bathroom, an even smaller closet, and almost enough room between the two full-size beds to throw four wet coats. This promised to be family intimacy beyond our wildest imaginations.

Love and a sense of humor prevailed. We organized a schedule for the bathroom, ignored each others' unladylike (ungentlemanly?) noises, ate out a lot, and cut our three-day stay to two days. Moving quickly past the initial disappointment, we agreed that what really mattered was being together. We weren't likely to repeat the adventure, but we couldn't wait to get home and share our outrageous experiences with others.

Back in the office after New Years, I noticed a similar urge among other Papier-Mache folks. Anecdotes entertained and paid homage to our families. Most included vivid descriptions of family members and depicted even the most frustrating events in a humorous light-a safe venting of leftover stress and strain. Without such storytelling, I wondered, would we e as prepared to venture forth the next year?

Our acquisition team began to envision a collection of these stories. We sent a letter to authors we'd published in the past and posted the idea on the internet. Within weeks family anecdotes poured in. To our delight the subject and the submission process drew in some writers we hadn't reached in the past: a fifteen-year-old writer from New York, a ninety-three-year-old newspaper columnist from Ohio, one of our own staff members.

Writers from across the country recalled the joy and madness, the tenderness and exasperation, of dealing with family members against the backdrop of Thanksgiving, Christmas, Passover, and other traditional family get-togethers. Rather than following the calendar, we've let the work flow like a leisurely holiday meal, serving course after course of laughter, poignancy, and appreciation of those rituals and traditions that simultaneously unite us and showcase our uniqueness. There's a dash of healthy cynicism here and there and a gentle reminder that others don't always have families to go home to.

There's also a generous helping of family recipes sprinkled throughout. Try them. They're delicious. Read the stories aloud to your family. Consider it an investment in your own holiday memories And remember: There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays.

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