“Father Kavanagh. Pen in hand and his notebook open before him, he was ready to do what he did every November: Get started on his Christmas list. By seven thirty a.m., he had prayed with his wife, checked his sugar, had his shot, and polished off his stone-ground oatmeal with raw honey and multigrain toast. This upbeat start on the morning had made him overconfident - his pen was poised but nothing was happening. The grand expectation of churning through the list was morphing into a muse.”
Those are some lines from the opening to Jan Karon’s novel My Beloved. It’s the 15th book in her beloved Mitford series about an Episcopal priest and the small town in which he lives.
If you’ve read the series, you know that Father Tim found love late in life, marrying Cynthia, the children’s book illustrator who moves in next door to him. You may also know that he adopted Dooley, a boy who tried to take care of his siblings when his delinquent parents did not.
In this story, Cynthia tells Tim that the only thing she wants for Christmas is a love letter. He writes it and then promptly loses it. The letter travels around the town and is the device Karon uses to update the reader on the doings of many of the characters that have appeared in her other books.
This is a sweet story about the people in a small town who care for one another. I’ve always thought that Cape Girardeau, though not small, is a similar kind of town. It’s a good reminder that there are many such places still in our country and that we should care for one another.
If you feel the same way, or are a fan of the Mitford series, then you must read My Beloved by Jan Karon.
