A Quilt for Christmas

A Quilt for Christmas
Gifted By: St. Martin's Press
By Sandra Dallas
www.stmartins.com
Reviewed by Mollyhall Seeley, Editor of FaveQuilts

Whether you're part of a guild or use quilting as a way to carve out a little alone time during the day, the art of quilting is inherently community-focused. Most quilters spend a great deal of their time and energy creating quilts for friends, family, babies, or charity. Even quilts intended for personal use inevitably wind up being passed around and shared. In other words, you can't separate the art of making the quilt from the use of the quilt.

That feeling of the many hands that handle and love a quilt during its lifetime is central to A Quilt for Christmas. In this novel by Sandra Dallas, a semi-prequel to her New York Times Best Seller The Persian Pickle Club, Eliza Spooner makes a quilt for her husband, Will, who's fighting for the Kansas Volunteers. But much like an old patchwork quilt, Eliza's life soon begins to come apart at the seams as she takes in a vulnerable woman and her child and is asked to harbor an escaped slave. With no word from Will, Eliza must decide her own heart and mind, and whether or not to take a stand. In times like this, where else is a woman to turn but the trusted women of her quilt group?

This book is wonderful for quilters and non-quilters alike. It's the story of love, of friendship, of bravery—and, of course, of quilting.