All I Have To Give by Melody Carlson

All I Have To Give by Melody Carlson ISBN-13: 9781441212801 ebook: 167 pages Publisher: Revell Released: September 1, 2008

Source: Free ebook during a promotion.

Book Description from Christianbook.com:
In this present-day retelling of O'Henry's The Gift of the Magi, Anna and Michael's dreams of having a baby have come to an end. Amidst her heartache, Anna secretly struggles with strange health problems that have her very worried. But as each tries to give the other the perfect Christmas gift, the magic of Christmas is working its way into their lives in a surprising way.


My Review:
All I Have To Give is Christian women's fiction and a re-telling of "The Gift of the Magi." Anna tried so hard to have a "perfect Christmas" that she almost ruined it with her attitude. While the characters always had a motivation for the way they were acting, I was on the borderline of being frustrated with them. Anna thought she had cancer and basically just gave up before even confirming it. She strongly suspected her husband of infidelity (with little evidence) and yet this didn't seem to impact her "grand gift" plans for him.

I felt like there was a missed chance at a deeper message of giving even when hurt and how this would inspire the other family members in their troubled marriages. Instead, everyone thought she had a perfect life (even when they knew she didn't feel that way about being childless) and a perfect, untroubled marriage. The story wrapped up quickly after the gift-giving and didn't resolve some of the serious issues brought up in the story.

The Christian element seemed to be a few statements along the lines of "but Christians shouldn't do that!" (about divorce). There was a very minor amount of "he swore" style of bad language. There was no sex. Overall, it's a nice, predictable story.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.