Twenty Wishes

Fifth of the Blossom Street series and it fills in a couple of gaps.

There is a small group of women around Blossom Street, of various ages, who have become widows. One Valentines' Day evening, they decide to each write a list of Twenty wishes.

Over the next 18 months things happen to help them reach the spirit of their wishes, if not necessarily all the items on their list.

Standard Macomber fare, that can border on the sweet and twee, but thankfully pulls away before it gets too sappy.

Easy afternoon read on a cold and windy April weekend!

This is the fourth book in the Blossom Street series by prolific author Debbie Macomber. The series began with The Shop on Blossom Street and continued with A Good Yarn and Back on Blossom Street. I was first intrigued by the series because of the knitting connection. Just like I love to read books about books, I also love to read books that have references to knitting. I'm not a master knitter by any stretch of the imagination, but I do love to knit. I've read and enjoyed each of the books in the series. They are light, fun, quick reads with a little more depth to them than many books in the same category. I have to admit that I was just a little disappointed in this latest installment. Lydia, the yarn store owner from the first couple show more books, barely made an appearance at all. In fact, the characters from the first several books were mentioned in passing but were not the main characters for this book. Instead of the series being focused on Lydia and the yarn store, it seems that Macomber is introducing a new store owner from Blossom Street with each new book. This is not really a criticism but more a misunderstanding on my part from what I thought the series was going to be.

In this book, we meet Anne Marie who owns a bookstore on Blossom Street. She's 38 years old and recently widowed. She'd married a much older man who had a family from a previous marriage. At the time of their marriage, Anne Marie didn't think that would be a problem for her. However, as the years passed she found herself desperately wanting to become a mother. She's now dealing with the death of her husband and trying to come to terms with the fact that she'll probably never have a child of her own.

The title of the book comes out of a Valentine's Day party held at the bookstore for several of her friends who are also widows. Though they come from different backgrounds and lifestyles, the women share the fact that they're all recently widowed. As each woman struggles to come to terms with her situation, they decide that they'll each make a list of twenty wishes -- not goals, but simply wishes. This was a way to rejoin the world of the living and look towards the future. I was actually intrigued by the idea of making a list of wishes. We all have things that we would love to be able to do at some point in our lives. I haven't actually started a list, but I have thought about a few things that I might include, such as going to Scotland. I dont' know if it'll ever happen, but it's nice to think about anyway.

As I said earlier, I enjoyed the book but was a little disappointed that there were few references to knitting and that so many new characters are introduced with few appearances from characters from previous books. Many of the individual story lines in the book ended predictably, but I didn't mind that all that much. I guess I'll wait and see what happens when the next book is published, but I'm not sure that I'll continue reading this series at this point. show less

Anne Marie Roche wants to find happiness again. At thirty-eight, her life is not what she had expected. She is childless, a recent widow, alone. She owns a successful bookstore on Seattle's Blossom Street, but despite her accomplishments, there is a feeling of emptiness.
On Valentine's Day, Anne Marie and several other widows get together to celebrate what? Hope, possibility, the future. They each begin a list of twenty wishes, things they always wanted to do but never did.
Anne Marie's list starts with: Find one good thing about life. It includes learning to knit, doing good for someone else, falling in love again. She begins to act on her wishes, and when she volunteers at a local school, an eight-year-old girl named Ellen enters her show more life. It is a relationship that becomes far more involving than Anne Marie intended. It also becomes far more important than she ever imagined.
As Ellen helps Anne Marie complete her list of twenty wishes, they both learn that wishes can come true but not necessarily in the way you expect. show less

An easy to read book. The dialogue felt stilted but the story was generally enjoyable and uplifting. It's weird to read a book and have every single character be straight and totally heteronormative. So there was that too.

Fourth and most recent in the Blossom Street series, this one follows a group of widows as they make Twenty Wishes and see their lives change because of it. Thankfully, the book centers on their wishes and *not* on grief and recovery (like so many books about knitting and widows do)! My only sadness is that there's very little about knitting in this one -- no knitting pattern, either, which should have been a clue about the lack of knitting content.

After the death of her husband and childless, 38 year old Anne Marie Roche feels lonely and yearns to be happy again. On Valentine's Day she decides to get together with other widows (Elise Beaumont, Lillie Higgins, and Barbie Foster) so none of them will be alone that day. They each decide to make a list of twenty wishes - things they always wanted to do but never did. All of them take their wishes seriously and all will discover that wishes can come true, but not always in the way you expect.

Debbie Macomber is one of the best writers of sweet romance novels and "Twenty Wishes" is one of her best novels. She has created four enjoyable characters - Anne Marie, Elsie, Lillie, and Barbie - who are looking for love again and find it in show more the most unlikely of places. To mix things up a bit, Macomber throws in a cute little eight year old girl to show that love can happen in many different ways. Each character's story is sweet (although Elise does get shortchanged a bit) and will make you smile. My favorites were Lillie and her daughter Barbie's very unlikely romances. What Debbie Macomber does best is create very likable characters that you will care about. Her stories are very sweet with some kissing - sex is talked about (barely) but never detailed. The twenty wishes is a nice gimmick that helps move the book right along. Her writing isn't particularly deep - the characters barely have any flaws - even eight year old Ellen, who has had so many bad things happen in her life that you think she would act out at least once but never does - and Macomber guarantees that everyone will have a happy ending. What makes Macomber's books so enjoyable is that she is a gifted storyteller who knows how to create fairy tales for adults that are guaranteed to keep a smile on your face.

"Twenty Wishes" is part of Debbie Macomber's Blossom Street series. The other books in the series are:

The Shop on Blossom Street (Blossom Street, No. 1)
A Good Yarn (Blossom Street, No. 2)
Susannah's Garden
Back on Blossom Street (Blossom Street, No. 3)

Enjoy! show less

Opening Sentence: '...It was six o'clock on Valentine's Day, an hour that should have marked the beginning of a celebration - the way it had when she and Robert were married. When Robert was alive...'

Didn't enjoy this as much as the first in the series THE SHOP ON BLOSSOM STREET but still a nice cozy read that I really need right now to sooth the soul. The book concentrates on four widows who meet at Anne Marie Roche's bookstore.

Anne Marie is the main focus of this book - she was separated from her husband after he refused to have a baby with her, they are on the point of reconciliation when he suddenly died. Lillie Higgins lost her husband in a plane crash, the same plane crash took the husband of her daughter, Barbie Foster. The last show more of the group, Elise Beaumont, became a widow after cancer claimed her husband. Together, the four decide to make wish lists of twenty wishes. With Elise's prodding, Anne Marie decides to fulfill one of her wishes—do good for someone else—and becomes a lunch buddy to an at-risk third grader. Anne Marie also has to deal with the reappearance of her adult stepdaughter, Melissa, who always hated her.

Although each of the women has something that they are seeking, their wishes don't necessarily turn out the way they imagine - some do. Yes the endings to each woman's story is pretty well predictable, I found getting there to be fun, enjoyable and soothing for me. They are feel good stories, and that is what a wanted and got. I wish I had a group of friends like this. show less