A Room With Books: Let It Snow by Maureen Johnson, John Green, and Lauren Myracle {Review}

Publisher: Speak

Publish Date: October 2, 2008

Source: Gift/Own

The weather outside is frightful, but these stories are delightful! When a huge blizzard (that doesn't show signs of stopping) hits, Gracetown is completely snowed in. But ven though it's cold outside, things are heating up inside, proving that the holiday season is magical when it comes to love. In three wonderfully (and hilariously!) interconnected tales, YA stars John Green, Lauren Myracle, and Maureen Johnson create a must-have collection that captures all the spirit of the holiday season.

Let It Snow is basically the most perfect holiday book ever. Could you really expect less from 3 amazing authors, though? First, I'll break it down into the tree stories.

The Jubilee Express by Maureen Johnson

Take hilarious shenanigans, Christmas, and romance; mix them thoroughly and what do you end up with? Magic, I tell you, magic. I can't even count how many times I laughed out loud while reading this. I could read a whole book about Jubilee because she's unintentionally hilarious. Plus, she's the type of girl who'll trudge through 5 feet of snow by herself to go to a Waffle House and that's the type of girl I like to read about.

Her relationship with Stuart is good even though they had a lot of unnecessary miscommunication at the end. They start out as strangers (Stuart seeming a little more strange upon first glance) in a Waffle House then progress to friendly jabs at each other, and finally they realize that being together is kind of nice. Basically what I'm saying is that it all felt really natural except, you know, for the fact that the first night they met she slept on his couch...

A Cheertastic Christmas Miracle by John Green

Mr. Green presents a familiar situation: guy friend and girl friend both like each other but neither realizes. Part of me was always going “Tobin, you idiot! Can you not see the googly eyes Duke is making and the massive elphant-sized hints she's dropping?!” But no, because I've totally been there. Before my (now) husband and I started dating I'm pretty sure everyone in the entire town knew we liked each other but could we see it? Hah, not a chance. So Tobin and Duke's relationship was predictable, but that didn't diminish its cuteness.

I liked that even though there were three (well, technically four, but he was mostly just on the phone) friends the third didn't just become a third wheel left out in the cold. JP (said third friend) was hilarious and had a great relationship with both Duke and Tobin and the story certainly wouldn't be the same without him.

The Patron Saint of Pigs by Lauren Myracle

Myracle's story wasn't the laugh-out-loud hilarious type like the other two, but it kind of ended up balancing everything out. Now, it's pretty obvious within the first couple pages that this will be a coming-to-terms-with-the-fact-that-you-need-to-change type of story, but again, predictability isn't always a bad thing.

I didn't really understand Addie. All the people closest to her are telling her she's self-absorbed and she refuses to listen and just rattles off all the problems with her life instead. Plus, why in the world would you break up with someone if YOU are the cheater and your other half DOESN'T want to break up? I just don't get it. That's kind of the point of Addie, though. She's dramatic and just does things but you get to see her grow into a better person by the end.

One of the best things about this little trio of stories is the way you get to watch them all come together. At first it's just a few references to people or happenings you heard about before, but then it all builds up into this giant avalanche of crossing paths and you see how everyone affected everyone else. It's pretty neat and (for the most part) believable too.