Christmas Spotlight on Vickie McDonough

Let me introduce to you Vickie McDonough today's Christmas Spotlight. She is an award winning author and has written of twelve novels. Vicki has been married to her husband Robert for thirty-two years. All of her life she has lived in a part of the Oklahoma Indian Territory except for one exciting year when she in her husband lived on a Kibbutz in Israel. So lets get to know more about Vickie.

Christmas carols are one of my favorite things about Christmas. What is your favorite carol?

I’m not exactly sure if this qualifies as a Christmas carol, but one of my favorite Christmas songs is “Mary, Did You Know?” I love that tune and the message. Another song I love is “What Child is This?”

Oh I love both of those. They are some of my favorites!!! Of course I am soon discovering l love most of the carols.

I remember sneaking with my sister into the living room one day where the tree stood and together we untapped all of the packages to see what we were getting. Thinking that we would get away with our little caper we rewrapped all of the presents. As my children would say we were ‘busted’ when our parents came home to presents that were not shall we say wrapped to perfection. Are you a person who loves the secrets and surprises or do you want to know what is hidden in the packages under the tree?

I love surprising my husband and kids with special gifts and other things, but don’t like surprises as much myself. Mainly, because my husband and kids aren’t too subtle and I usually find out what the surprise is way in advance because they’ll leave the receipt lying around or something like that.

As a child did you do any sneaking around to discover hidden presents?

Oh, ouch! Confession time. Yes, I’ll admit my sister and I did peak at our presents one year. Our mom worked so we were home all day once school was out and had too much time on our hands. We decided to peak at our gifts and were extremely careful and slit the tape with a knife, peaked at the presents, then rewrapped them. Our parents never knew because we were careful to rewrapped the gifts without making any new folds in the paper. Pride was our downfall. Dad loved wrapping gifts and trying to trick us. For each of us, he had put a new transistor radio (showing my age here) into a round coffee can and wrapped it. When we were ready to open them, he said “I bet you’ll never guess what’s in that.” Well, I can’t remember who, but probably my little sister, blabbed. It couldn’t have been me. J But honestly, I don’t remember anything except the upset look on my dad’s face when he realized what we had done. We eventually got our radios, but I’m pretty sure he made us wait a week or two as punishment.

Kim and I didn't re-wrap all that well and now our re-wrapping story has become family legend!
What led you to write a Christmas story?

I was on a novella team and we had sent in a proposal for a story set in Texas in a little town started by four retired Texas Rangers. When the Rangers got bored, they started matchmaking. Our editor liked the idea and asked if we could add a Christmas element, and of course we said sure! Since then I’ve done several Christmas novellas, mainly because that’s the only kind of novellas that my publisher does now. Writing stories set at Christmastime is a lot of fun. It’s such a time of hope and happiness that works well into a story.

I know that I love Christmas stories because of the very reason you said it is full of a time of hope and happiness.

What pet peeves do you have associated with the Holiday season?

My biggest pet peeve is how retailers and the media are trying to take Christ out of Christmas. All that leaves is “mas” or a mess. Jesus is the reason for the season, and we wouldn’t even have Christmas without him. My hope is that in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season that each of us can remember what’s really important. Another thing I personally don’t like is the abbreviation of X-mas for Christmas. I know there are times we all need to abbreviate the word, but I’m on a one-woman campaign to change it to T-mas. When that’s hand written, I make the “T” look like a cross, thus keeping Christ in my Christmas abbreviation.

I am right there with you. I hate that retailers and the media take Christ out of the equation. I will also join you in the "T-Mas" if I ever need to abbreviate the word. I think it could catch on.

Could you please briefly describe your novel?

A Bride By Christmas is the story of four people who must marry by Christmas to prevent something bad from happening. The four stories are all set on the American prairie and each story has a heroine originally from another country—England, Ireland, Holland, & the Ukraine. Each heroine incorporates some of her native country’s traditions into her Christmas celebrations. In my novella, AN IRISH BRIDE FOR CHRISTMAS, a judge gives Jackson Lancaster until Christmas to find a bride or lose custody of his only living relative, his recently-orphaned toddler niece.

Where can readers find you on the web?
My website: www.vickiemcdonough.com
Blog: www.bustlesandspurs.com (I blog here on the 15th of each month)

If you would like to win a copy of this novella please leave a comment with a way to contact you and tell me: What book would you like to see on my blog next?

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