THE CHRISTMAS STRANGER

A brokenhearted man sees no reason to live in this Christmas tale of hope and healing.

In 2014, Paul Wanless and his wife, Rachel, attend a Christmas pageant in which their 7-year-old son, Jaxon, plays one of the Wise Men. Paul drives home separately and learns that his beloved family has just been killed by a drunk driver. Three years later, Paul, a diabetic, decides to end his life with whiskey and insulin. But a stranger named Gabriel invites himself into the house and persuades Paul that he needs to keep living. Gabriel—surely the angel—shows up at several pivotal moments, just long enough to save Paul from complete disaster. “Sometimes the path to heaven begins in hell,” Gabriel says. Later, Paul meets a sweet widow named Collette, and the attraction is mutual. But he endures a deep reservoir of pain that might make it impossible to get on with his life. She, too, has suffered loss, having witnessed her husband die from ALS. Then one day, Paul rescues 9-year-old Ronald from a beating several bullies are giving him outside of school. Ronald’s divorced mother stays home drinking herself into a stupor, and his father is out of the picture, so Paul tries to help the boy as much as a non-relative can. Three sympathetic characters, three broken lives—can they ever recover? And if Paul were to fall in love again, would that betray Rachel? An answer will come, but first, people must see through their pain and hurt to get to the other side. Now Christmas is fast approaching, and Paul had been an avid “Christmasphile” until his tragedy. The three characters’ storylines weave a holiday tapestry culminating—when else?—on a snowy Christmas Day. Indeed, all the story elements come together in a bright, neat bow as though left under the tree by Santa. There are a few eye-rollers having to do with Paul’s generosity, as well as a fact that would be a spoiler to reveal. Gabriel is believable, though. He’s just an angel doing his job.

Warm, cozy yuletide fare.