Season’s Readings: More Sweet, Funny, and Strange Holiday Tales from the Bethlehem Writers Group, LLC
October 13, 2024 by Bethlehem Writers Group in category From a Cabin in the Woods by Members of Bethlehem Writers Group tagged as Bethlehem Writers Group LLC, new release, Seasons Readings
In this new addition to the “Sweet, Funny, and Strange” series of short-story anthologies, the multi-award-winning Bethlehem Writers Group, LLC, returns to its roots. As denizens in and around Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, (also known as “Christmas City, USA”) we were happy to make our first anthology a collection of holiday tales. But one volume just wasn’t enough. Now, in the eighth anthology, we’re returning to the theme to bring you twenty-one new stories that span the holidays from Thanksgiving through New Year’s Eve.
Emwryn Murphy’s sweet tale tells about a chosen family’s “Friendsgiving,” crashed by a blood-relative who might, or might not, be happy with what he sees in “As Simple As That.” Jerome W. McFadden once again reveals his humorous side in his story about a would-be Santa who gets into trouble in “Flue Shot.” A. E. Decker shares an intricate Christmas fantasy about “The Goblin King’s Music Box.” And Paula Gail Benson gives new meaning to a traditional symbol for the New Year in “Star of the Party.” Beyond these holidays, Debra H. Goldstein writes about Pearl Harbor Day, Diane Sismour about Krampusnacht, and Peter J Barbour about Hanukkah. Other favorite BWG authors, including Jeff Baird, Ralph Hieb, D. T. Krippene, Dianna Sinovic, Christopher D. Ochs, Kidd Wadsworth, and Carol L. Wright, also share their holiday musings.
In addition, this volume includes award-winning stories from the 2023 and 2024 Bethlehem Writers Roundtable Short Story Awards. Sally Milliken, the first-place winner in 2023, presents “The First Thanksgiving.” From 2024, we have our top three winners with first-place winner Rhonda Zangwill’s “Oh! Christmas Tree,” second-place winner Bettie Nebergall’s “Just Ask Santa,” and third-place winner Mary Adler’s “Narragansett Nellie and the Transferware Platter.”
We hope you enjoy these holiday gifts and that all our readers have the very happiest of holiday seasons.
Other Books by Bethlehem Writers Group
The Gifts by Kidd Wadsworth
February 27, 2023 by Kidd Wadsworth in category Infused with Meaning by Kidd Wadsworth tagged as fiction, kidd wadsworth, Seasons Readings, short story, Short Story Award, short story contest
She placed the three gifts on the mantle, each beautifully wrapped: one in gold foil paper with a white ribbon it’s bow a dove, the second in green and white striped paper like a mint candy cane was topped with a green paper pine tree, the third in classic red and white Merry Christmas paper was adorned with three large red bows. Otherwise, the room and house were undecorated. She couldn’t bring herself to carry all the boxes of ornaments and lights down from the attic. Mike used to that. He would shout, “Ho, ho, ho and where’s my hot toddy!” Christmas decorating had always begun the same way with Mike carrying box after box down the stairs and her in the kitchen juicing lemons and then screaming, “I forgot to buy bourbon!”
By the time she returned from the store, he’d have the tree up, Christmas music playing, and strings of lights spread out on the floor. “Did you buy replacement bulbs?”
She turned on the gas fireplace. It was cozy room—a lonely room. She pushed down the yearning inside of her soul. “Don’t go there,” she whispered.
She bulwarked heart with memories of other Christmases. Presents and more presents, how rich her parents had been. And each Christmas morning ended the same way, with wrapping paper strown about and delicious smells of ham wafting from the kitchen, and presents, so many presents and not a single gift she liked: clothes, all in shades of navy and mauve, clothes she would never wear, high-heeled shoes that hurt her feet, make-up—didn’t her mother ever look at her face? She didn’t use makeup. At her church they had a Christmas tree with tags on it: stuffed animal, girl’s coat size 8, mittens, boy’s backpack, etc. Surely her Christmases were like the Christmases of those children. All the gifts bought by people who didn’t know them, who didn’t really understand them. Year after year, she slowly learned. Don’t get your hopes up. No one knows you. You are their daughter, but they don’t see you.
Now twenty-eight years old she understood. She had reconciled her expectations to the reality of the world. It was impossible to really know another human being. So, every Christmas she bought herself presents. All sorts of wonderful things like copper cookie cutters and an antique bookshelf. She cooked what she loved including pumpkin pie with extra cloves. She never offered anyone a slice of her pumpkin pie. That would have been cruel—too, too cruel.
And every Christmas she put Mike’s gifts back up on the mantle and dreamed of what could be inside. Their first Christmas together he had stormed out when she refused to open his present. “Please understand, I just can’t be disappointed anymore. What we have is so special, I don’t want to damage it. I can’t bear knowing that you’re the same as my parents. That you don’t really get me.”
He had come back, of course he’d come back. He’d held her.
The next Christmas she’d put the green and white striped present on the mantle, and their third Christmas the present with the red and white Merry Christmas paper. By then Mike had adapted. He brought home hundreds of small things for her. A new mixer, he’d gotten her the red one to match the paint she’d picked out for the kitchen walls. A cup holder for her car that expanded to hold her giant coffee mug. Caffeine and cloves, yup! He was Santa all year long.
“Someday you’ll trust me,” he’d said. “Someday, you’ll open the gifts.”
But that someday didn’t come—no one is supposed to die at twenty-six. She looked up at the gifts on the mantle. “The last two probably just have rocks in them to make them rattle. I mean he wouldn’t keep wrapping up stuff knowing I wasn’t going to open the presents.”
She turned away and turned back again.
“My memories are all I have, Mike. I don’t want to find out that it wasn’t really as good as I thought it was. I don’t want to know that you were only human. You tried hard. I know you did. And this way, I can keep on pretending that you loved me, that you really understood.”
She sipped her hot toddy.
This is the beginning of a story I’m considering for the Bethlehem Writer’s Group new anthology. By the way, did I mention the Bethlehem Writer’s Group’s short story contest is now open for submissions? Click here for details: https://bwgwritersroundtable.com/
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