Home for Christmas

R.G. Moyles is professor emeritus of English at the University of
Alberta, the co-author of Imperial Dreams and Colonial Realities:
British Views of Canada, 1880–1914, and the author of The Salvation
Army and the Public.

Is there something special about a Maritime or Newfoundland Christmas?
Perhaps not, for Christmas is largely a state of mind and is built on
memories that seem special and distinctive. And yet, with the ocean
pounding at their door and with a lifestyle so different from that lived
by Quebecers, prairie dwellers, or Ontario farmers, the Maritimers and
Newfoundlanders have Christmas memories (the latter quite different from
the former) that evoke an actuality, when written down, of a unique
place and people. Where but in Newfoundland could the Christmas stories
of Ray Guy and Ted Russell have happened? From the pens of Harry Bruce,
David Helwig, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Robert Gibbs, Wayne Johnston, and
others we are offered 31 Christmas experiences—some sentimental, some
realistic, some happy, some sad—that will make not just Christmas but
any time of the year much richer for having been read.