A Cinderella Christmas Carol

by Hope C. Tarr

[Cocktails and Books]

This was an interesting twist on A Christmas Carol. Same premise: Christmas past, present and future is shown to a somewhat bitter (putting it mildly) Starr on Christmas Eve. The twist comes in the form of a ghost who looks just like Matt Landry, the magazine art director Starr can't stop thinking about.

Starr is a woman who is driven to exceed and not be in a situation like her mother was. That drive causes her to cut herself from everyone and focus on the bottom line. Needless to say, Starr doesn't have friends and her co-workers don't really like her. So what's it going to take to get Starr to see that she needs to make a drastic change her life before she becomes a crabby old cat woman? Enter the ghostly apparition of Matt Landry. It may not really be Matt, the art director at her magazine who she secretly has a crush on, but he's about to show her a condensed version of Christmas' past, present and future with the hopes that this year Starr will start to believe.

Starr is definitely not a woman who is very likable at the beginning of the story. But through her journey and the sly comments of ghostly Matt, we can see just how Starr got to be the person she is and who the one person is that could change Starr's outlook, both personally and professionally. In the end, Starr has to make the tough decision to continue on the path she's on or to take a chance that her life won't end up like her mother's.

If you're someone who enjoys A Christmas Carol, this is definitely going to be a story right up your alley. Hope Tarr does a great job of putting a romantic twist on the old tale and turning Starr into a character you really like at the end.