Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Mystery Book...

I love getting emails from readers, and sometimes they are just too good to keep to myself. I received this one today from someone who mysteriously stumbled upon The Paper Bag Christmas...

Hi Mr. Milne!

My name is [name withheld], and I live in a small town in the hill country in Texas. Last night God gave me your book, The Paper Bag Christmas. Okay, well, maybe not God... but someone did. I live with two other people and it belonged to none of us, we'd never seen it before, but there it was, just sitting on our bookshelf. I am a firm believer in the magic and love of Christmas-time, so I decided to read it. I finished it all in one sitting, and don't know that I've ever cried so hard in a book.

My nephew passed away from cancer in a children's hospital 5 years ago, and it was by far the hardest thing to endure to date. I was incredibly moved by the story and how much love was shown on every single page. I'm a big time crier, so there was no chance of a dry eye of course, but in a good way!

I currently work with at-risk kids as a counselor, having only gotten my Bachelor's in Psychology a year and a half ago. I am not sure why this book appeared on my bookshelf for me to read, but I thank you for writing it, and inspiring me to try my hardest to love everyone and reach out to everyone I can, including the children I work with. I can't wait to go to church this week and thank God for putting it on my shelf, too. I try not to think about my nephew too much, but this book made me, and made me feel some sort of peace. I didn't know what to do so I decided to write you this e-mail in hopes of a response and your take on this strange Christmas story!

2 comments:

The Armitage Family said...

Wow! What an inspiring message!

Anonymous said...

Dear Mr.Milne
My name is Ivana, and I've only read one of your books and that book is The Paper Bag Christmas.

I'm a student here at AEWright Middle School. I'm in seventh grade though I'm supposed to be in eight grade. I didn't really get held back because I failed school or something, I got held back because I'm from Norway and I didn't speak English when I came here to America.

So about your book, it really inspired me, and now thanks to you I know the real meaning of christmas, and every night I read The Paper Bag Christmas to my little borther before he goes to sleep, he loves the book as much as I do.
I really enjoyed The Paper Bag Christmas and I really want to read The Nine Lessons, and Little Misfortune, they both sound like wonderful books and I know they're going to be good books because you're a wonderfull writer.

I really look forward to reading your future books Mr.Milne!
Best regards,
Ivana Hassani