Mary Balogh – лучшие книги

CHRISTMAS GIFTS brings together three previously published and long out-of-print novellas, each on the theme of Christmas gifts that will last forever because the gift, in essence, is love. In «The Best Christmas Ever» a boisterous house party is in progress and all the children when asked are eager to tell what they want for Christmas. But one man feels sad, for his young child has not spoken since her mother died and he does not know if the gifts he has bought her will be what she really wants. Unknown to him her one fervent wish is for the new mother for Christmas, and when she sees one of the guests she knows who that will be. But the lady concerned has an unhappy history with the child's father. In «The Porcelain Madonna» a gentleman becomes involved with helping an impoverished lady, who thinks of everyone's happiness but her own. However, he has seen her gaze with longing at a porcelain madonna well beyond her means displayed in a shop window. In «The Surprise Party» a man and woman who are antagonistic to each other find themselves landed with the care over Christmas of children who are related to each of them. They quarrel over which of them should undertake the task. It is not a happy situation until the children teach them the true meaning of Christmas and of love and they discover that they can do it together.

CHRISTMAS MIRACLES brings together three previously published and long out-of-print novellas, each of which demonstrates how the wonder of the season can bring together two would-be lovers or two estranged lovers and create a bond between them that will last a lifetime and beyond. In «The Wassail Bowl» an aristocrat has summoned his young son to a family house party but is disconcerted when his estranged wife and her illegitimate daughter arrive with him. When he expresses his displeasure, she picks up a large bowl of wassail from the hall table and dumps its sticky contents over his head. The only way for the story to proceed after that is up! In «The Bond Street Carolers» a gentleman who hates Christmas is appalled when his ears are assailed on fashionable Bond Street by a group of inferior carolers–until, that is, he is rooted to the spot by the pure soprano voice of a young boy soloist. As a connoisseur of music and the arts, he must have the boy to sing at one of his concerts–but the child's widowed mother will have nothing to do with what she sees as exploitation. In «Guarded by Angels» an estranged couple are separately marooned at the same cottage by a snow storm and must spend Christmas together without coming to blows. But they have a great deal of assistance from their very different guardian angels.