Christmas With Tucker
Series: The McCray Family, Book 2
By: Greg Kincaid / Narrated By: Mark Bramhall
Length: 5 hrs and 7 mins
At times heartbreaking, at times super sweet—ALWAYS warms the heart
Do you want heartwarming this Christmas? You can’t go wrong with Greg Kincaid and his McCray family series.
In Christmas With Tucker, an older George gathers items of emotional significance and is thrown back to a time where a younger George (aged thirteen) is living on the same farm but is dealing with the loss of his father in a tractor accident earlier that summer. Life has broken all the rules young George thinks there were, especially since his mother has left to Minnesota also, leaving him in the care of Grandpa Bo and Grandma Cora.
A ne’er do-well, Frank Thorne, has just had a run-in with the law, and Grandpa Bo has taken in the man’s dog to care for while Frank’s troubles can be worked out. A dog? At first young George resents having to care for the animal, especially as he’s had to take on some of his father’s chores and duties, as well as continue to do his own, as well as continue to go to school. But he soon discovers that Tucker is a dog in a million, and his grief is now somewhat abated by the love Tucker shows him.
Christmas With Tucker is a journey back into a simpler time without television, a harder time where there was no room to quibble or whine about what has been thrown your way. Life does as Life will, and the sooner you get a stiff upper lip, the better for everyone. There is now, however, Tucker at George’s side, so things seem much different; there is love where there used to be only wide empty spaces. But not for long, as Tucker has to go back to Frank. And Frank is a man George believes shouldn’t have a dog.
The book is good because Frank is an alcoholic, and soon George comes to see his basic humanity, his basic dignity. He begins to see alcoholism as an unfair disease rather than something only weak and unworthy individuals acquire. As the story progresses, things get quite touching indeed.
Along the way, there is the most brutal winter Kansas has seen in fifty years. There is being torn between living in Kansas and soon having to leave all he’s ever known, all he’s ever loved, to move to Minnesota. There’s trying to have Christmas, the first without his father.
And always, there’s the love of a good dog, Tucker.
You simply can’t go wrong with this audiobook. Mark Bramhall turns in a fine performance yet again, this time as he does the gruff Grandpa Bo, the earnest and grieving (and sometimes joyful) young George, the faith-filled Grandma Cora, the teasing Mary Ann (ah, love begins blossoming at such an early age!).
Have I made Christmas With Tucker sound bleak and filled with grief? Oh, so sorry! Don’t mean that at all! Rather, it’s a testament to the heart, a testament to Christmas and family. And Tucker is most definitely a testament to sure and unswerving love!
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