By James Holland

This book of true Christmas Stories is about a man from Hope, Arkansas, who at age 8 saw the Beatles on the “Ed Sullivan Show” in 1964 and instantly decided he wanted a guitar for Christmas so he could become one of the Beatles. Eventually his band, Capitol Offense, was playing as an opening act for Willie Nelson, Grand Funk Railroad, the Charlie Daniels Band, Dionne Warwick, and Percy Sledge at such venues as The New Orleans House of Blues and the Red Rock Amphitheatre.

This man who grew up dirt poor from the sleepy little country town in the mountains of central Arkansas located near the Crater of Diamonds mine and nearby Hot Springs decided he wanted to enter politics. He ran and became Lt. Governor and later Governor. He then decided to run for President of the United States as the Man From Hope. Is this man Bill Clinton? No this is another resident of that same tiny Arkansas town—Mike Huckabee. Since this reviewer has visited the childhood homes of Bill Clinton in Hope, it’s amazing that such a tiny place has produced two such prominent politicians.

This reviewer is not a big Mike Huckabee fan, but this book has some very moving non-political messages in it. Even a jaded, cynical critic like me found some pretty powerful messages in at least three of the chapters in this autobiographical book. Those dramatic Christmas stories may have affected me as strongly as they did because I’m currently going through a similar situation with a life-and-death battle against cancer of the spine that Huckabee’s young bride faced only a year after they were married. The surgeons didn’t know whether anything could be done to save her and even if the cancer proved to be operable, they were worried that the spinal cord might be damaged and the young woman would be paralyzed.            

The young Huckabees experienced at least two miracles from that single experience. First the scheduled 8-hour surgery was over in less than three hours and the future-Governor and his sister were surprised to see the surgeon coming down the hall fully dressed and ready to leave after only two and a half hours. They were terrified that meant very bad news, but the neurosurgeon said, “No,” the five-inch tumor had wrapped itself around the spinal cord, but turned out to not be attached to it. The doctor removed it without touching the spinal cord. Mrs. Huckabee made a full recovery and even after being told she would never be able to have children because of the follow-up radiation treatments, the couple eventually had three wonderful, perfectly healthy children.            

Huckabee said some of the lessons he learned from this terrible trail were as follows:            

“That God’s greatest gift to us is not to remove us from a crisis, but to walk through crisis with us.”           

“True faith is forged in the furnace, not the showroom.”            

“I would pray. ‘Why is this happening to us?’ It seemed like the answer was ‘Why not you? Are you too good to experience the hardships that the rest of the world has to live through?’”

These lessons and others the author details about how this first-hand experience with miracles was only another of the important lessons he learned as a 20-year old man. His words give hope to all of us.

As the title suggests, this collection of twelve Christmas stories from Huckabee’s life do celebrate the true holiday spirit of simple Christmases. Not all of them will move the reader to tears, but they all have a moral and in just a few instances it’s easy to see the source of the former Arkansas Governor’s conservative philosophy. This is the story of a man who lived the American dream and moved from real poverty to the highest level of American success that hard work and trust in God allows. This is definitely an inspiring read even for the Ex-Governor’s political opponents and people who simply don’t like him.

A Simple Christmas is also filled with, nostalgic folksy language such as “Spoke Southern, potato salad time, garbage soup, Gene Autry’s Cowboy Guitar, all cola drinks are called cokes (even Dr. Pepper), Grandma ‘Go-Go’ and ‘Huckabee’ means people of the hill.”

Another obvious observation to be gained from this book is how the residents of Hope didn’t grow up feeling that they were poor or victims. They were all too busy working three or four different jobs. There is a charming section in the book about Mike’s Uncle Garvin Elder. He was a much awaited visitor to the Huckabee home each Christmas and most summer vacations. He loved to walk around town with Mike and his sister in tow. He was the only man in town wearing a suit, white starched shirt and tie. He was considered rich because of the way he dressed and the fact he actually owned a nice suitcase. Most citizens of Hope didn’t even own a white shirt, tie, suit or a decent piece of luggage. Some of these descriptions make the town of Hope, Arkansas even more amazing.

A Simple Christmas: Twelve Stories That Celebrate the True Holiday Spirit (Sentinel HC/ Nov 2009) is a wonderful read. The town seems to have some kind of political magic in the drinking water.

Readers Be Warned: Get Some Kleenex Before Starting This Book. If you’re human you are going to need to have it handy.

Glenn Beck: National Debt to Balloon to $806 Billion

James Holland is Author of Adventure Photographer (A Bit of Boston Books/ 2009)

Copyright © 2006-2010, Basil & Spice. All rights reserved.