The Everafter by Amy Huntley

8 of 10: The Everafter is just the kind of teen book I like. A quick read, a sweet romance, a little mystery, and a strong premise. Perfect for a snow day.

The Morris Award short list came out a few weeks ago - five young adult books by first-time authors. Last year, I read all five and thought several of them were quite terrific. I had planned on attempting to read all five again this year before the winner was announced in January, but then the list came out and frankly, none of them seemed that appealing to me.

Then Kimberly posted a little blurb about each one and the premise of The Everafter (a book I had heard nothing about) grabbed me enough that I put in a request for it at the library that same day. 

The basic premise is that Maddy, age seventeen, finds herself dead, in a place with objects that she lost during her life (toys, hair clips, homework, etc). By touching them, she can return to the moments in her life when those items were lost.

Maddy becomes a bit obsessed with figuring out how she died, revisiting scenes of her life over and over. She even discovers how to make small changes in the moments she visits, but if she alters it so that her former self finds what was lost, the object is gone from the Everafter and she can no longer visit that moment, so she has to be careful.

The order of the memories, of course, is not in chronological order. She jumps around between infancy and toddlerhood, to a childhood trip to Disneyland and the time her best friend broke her arm when they both fell out of a tree, to her high school years, many of them revolving around her boyfriend, Gabe.

I didn't guess how Maddy died until just a few pages before it's revealed (if Bart had been reading this book, I'm sure he would have surmised from the first few chapters, but I'm a lousy guesser and I usually don't even consciously try and figure it out).

This book reminded me quite a lot of Elsewhere,  which I read and reviewed a few years ago, but without an ending that completely disappointed me. The various fantasies about what might happen after death are so intriguing for me to read. 

This isn't the best book you'll ever read, but it's a fun and quick read - I flew through it in a few hours, enjoying every second of it. Maybe I'll give another of those Morris books a chance after all.

Snow Day(s)

Yesterday, I woke up, rolled out of bed, and checked my email. There was an email from our church alerting us that, due to the crazy snow storm that had rolled in overnight, church would be canceled. Here it was, seven thirty in the morning, and we suddenly had absolutely zero obligations or places to be.

I never got dressed yesterday; I spent the entire day in my pajamas, and it was delightful. I made blueberry muffins and put stew in the crockpot. I finished three books.

Then, in the early evening, I went into the bedroom and saw the red light on my cell phone flashing that I had missed a call and received a voicemail. I listened to the voice on the message identify itself as the assistant superintendent for my school district and announce that, due to the snow, school on Monday was canceled. "Repeat, school on Monday, December 21st has been canceled."

Since I went to school in Las Vegas where snow basically never happens (except last year when it delayed our trip to Vegas by a day), this is my very first snow day ever. If that's not a lovely way to kick off the week of Christmas, well, I don't know what is.

Today, I may muster my strength and scrape off the car so I can go return my Redbox movie and check out "Julie & Julia." I also am dangerously close to being out of Honey Nut Cheerios, so you can see why I need to leave the house. I also have library books that are due.

Poor Bart waited in vain for a similar snow day call from his office. Alas, he was forced to brave the snow and walk to the T stop.

The Night Before

For the last ten or fifteen years, my favorite part of Christmas has been our family's Christmas Eve meal.

We call it our "Shepherds' Meal" and we have a very simple dinner - soup in bread bowls and sparkling cider (the only occasion in my life that there is actually enough sparkling cider to drink as much as you want). We sit on the floor near the fireplace. We wear various costumes, mainly of the bathrobe and towel variety, although my Aunt Miriam really helped us step it up a few years ago with a large box of Biblical costumes.

Afterward, we recite the Christmas story from Luke (years ago, my parents assigned each of us a verse or two and we memorized them. Even now, only doing it once a year, we can recite our parts without mistakes on that evening).

This has been a terrific part of our Christmas celebrations for all these years. It is a low-stress, low-preparation meal, it's quiet and low-key at the end of the day, and it focuses on the birth of the Savior, and away from the frenzy of gift anticipation and Santa and the other fun, but ultimately non-central parts of Christmas, which sometimes can become just overwhelming, especially for kids, on Christmas Eve. 

It's a tradition that I love, and one that Bart and I plan to carry on with our own children someday. 

Things I've Been Doing Instead of Blogging

• Dealing with my fourth (or possibly fifth) cold of the school year. Delightful.
• Watching Little Dorrit (Ralphie would be proud) (what would winter be without these kinds of movies?)
• Losing my mind with joy at the Scholastic warehouse sale. 30 books for $160, mostly hardbound (these were, of course, all for the school library, not for my home library).
• Putting up the Christmas tree (bless Bart for suggesting we do it).
• Christmas cards (our first year doing them! Kind of exciting, actually).
• Making a valient effort to plow through my library books and return them.
• Ordering Christmas presents (this is the first year I am really, truly ready for Christmas well in advance).
• Listening to Christmas music (we've fallen in love with Celtic Woman): 

Home Again, Home Again

Bart has been in Florida for the last two weeks, finally returning home to me on Friday evening. Here are some signs that he's home:

• my cell phone doesn't need to be charged daily
• the dishes magically do themselves
• I eat something besides cereal for dinner
• My voice isn't thick from lack of use all afternoon and evening once I get home from school
• The laundry is done!
  
• I don't have to convince myself that there are no monsters in the apartment when I'm falling asleep
• I have to share the bathroom sink when I get ready in the morning
• Lunches get magically made and are ready when I leave for work
• When I watch movies on the couch, someone rubs my feet

Who wouldn't be glad he's home?