The Children's Blizzard

“The Children’s Blizzard” by Melanie Benjamin   368 pages

January 12, 1888, it was a balmy day in Minnesota. It was blessed relief for the immigrant homesteaders following a nasty cold spell. Heavy coats, mittens, scarves, clothing were all left at home as children made their way to their one-room schoolhouse. 

As the close of the school day neared, children, and even the teachers, were eager to get outside and enjoy the sunshine. As they prepared to go home, black clouds raced into the area with hurricane-force winds, heavy snow mixed with icy pellets, and the temperature plummeting.   

As they noticed the impending storm, some of the children ran outside, determined to get home before it. Others lingered behind, unsure what to do. Teachers weren’t really sure either. Send the kids home and hope they made it or take shelter in the schoolhouse and pray that the storm would either blow over or not be as severe as it appeared. 

Melanie Benjamin’s latest novel focuses on the storm and its aftermath. The two main protagonist of the story are Raina and Gerda, two schoolteachers who made the opposite decisions. At Gerda’s school, she kept the children inside. Raina had her children tie themselves together with the girls’ apron strings and out they headed. No one lived too far away, and Raina was sure they could all make it. One group of children froze to death; the other suffered deaths and frostbite. 

The story opens on that warm day several hours before the storm hits. The storm is the novel’s antagonist. It is a formidable foe bent on claiming as many lives as possible. I didn’t realize how many different ways a wordsmith like Benjamin could describe the storm. 

While the storm may have been the main character, the heart of the story is the life of immigrant homesteaders. It is a story of the people who settled the Great Plains and their daily struggles to survive.  

Benjamin based her story using actual oral histories of the survivors, but the characters are fictional. It is based on the store that hammers the Great Plains on that January day in 1888. The actual storm took 235 lives, many of them children, and many were not found until spring.  “The Children’s Blizzard” is a compelling and heartbreaking story. It receives 6 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world. 

 

The White Christmas Inn

“The White Christmas Inn” by Colleen Wright  288 pages

The Evergreen Inn in Vermont is the quintessential New England Inn. Add a blizzard, Christmas, people in desperate need of a miracle and you have a wonderful holiday tale. It’s especially heartwarming given the global pandemic that we have faced for the last two years. 

The Inn’s owners, Jeanne and Tom, have two major hurdles to overcome. First is their relationship, which seems to get more and more strained with each passing day. Second is the inn. Since a new luxury ski resort was built about twenty miles up the road, no one wants a charming B&B anymore. They can barely pay their bills and have made the tough decision to close after the new year.

But this holiday seems a little brighter. One of their long-time guests, Hannah, has been coming to the Inn since she was a little girl with her family. Now an adult, Hannah has chosen Evergreen Inn as the venue for her wedding. It will be a small affair, immediate family only, but at least the rooms are occupied.

Things go awry when Hannah’s finance gets cold feet and calls off the wedding. Hannah isn’t as devastated as she, and everyone else, thought she would be. Her summer’s crush, Luke, has dropped by the inn to check on his grandmother. who is the inn’s hostess. The sparks fly even before he gets in the door. Jeanne and Tom are sad that all the rooms aren’t going to be full after all, but mostly they are distressed about the wedding.

There is one other guest at the inn, Molly. She has checked in for a few days. She’s a writer and illustrator of children’s books. Her new book is due soon, but she has absolutely no story idea. Scrounging the internet, she fell in love with the inn.

Then the blizzard arrives. A real Nor’easter it is. The Highway Patrol has closed all the roads. A couple of stragglers manage to make their way to the inn to spend the night. One is Marcus, a widower with two small girls, and the other is grouchy Englishman who rubs on everyone’s nerves. Even Luke is forced to bunk down at the inn since he cannot get to his parents’ house.

 As the character’s stories intertwine, author Colleen Wright, mixes up a tale of romance and magic that is sure to set a sweet start to the holidays.

There is one thing that really irritated me though. I’m guessing that the novel’s title comes from the snowstorm on Christmas Eve, since it snowed in feet, not inches.  That seemed more like gimmick to get people to at least pick it up and, hopefully, buy it.  Therefore, “The White Christmas Inn” receives 4 out of 5 stars in Julie’s world.