Mr. Ives' Christmas
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Robert Fass
About this listen
In 1960s New York, Edward Ives is a picture of the American dream. Adopted as a child by a widowed print shop manager who helped him cultivate a love of drawing, he now has a successful career as an illustrator in advertising, a beautiful home with his wife and muse, Annie, and two loving children. But this idyllic life is brutally wrenched away when Ives’s 17-year-old son, Robert is murdered in a crime of opportunity that proves to be as random as it is senseless.
Consumed by grief, Ives withdraws from the world. Grappling with a loss of faith—a force that has guided him steadfastly since childhood—he starts to question every aspect of human existence, contemplating what it really means to live an emotionally and spiritually fulfilling life. This mourning consumes him—until faces his son's killer.
Mr. Ives' Christmas is a tender, passionate story of a man working to rediscover what it means to love and forgive after unspeakable tragedy. It is another tremendous achievement from one of America’s most talented writers.
Includes a Reading Group Guide.
Critic Reviews
"Dickens himself, mentioned frequently in the narrative, haunts it like the Ghost of Christmas Past, but Mr. Hijuelos transcends his model even as he embraces him . . . The shortest of Oscar Hijuelos's recent novels, ''Mr. Ives' Christmas'' is in my judgment both the deepest and the best."—New York Times
"A new classic for a new age, a bracing reminder of the difference between love and romance, from a writer whose gifts I admire and, maybe, envy."—NPR
"It is significant that Mr. Ives's most prized possession is a signed edition of Dickens's A Christmas Carol. Hijuelos, best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of Cuban exile, The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, breathes new life into the Victorian Christmas genre. Highly recommended."—Library Journal
"A Dickensian tale of redemption through dignified suffering."—Publishers Weekly
"An honest, moving account of a man, his family, and the changing city they live in . . . Hijuelos shows himself this time to be that vanishing, valuable thing: a writer, even if not uniformly polished, whose passions can make art out of what for others would remain only issues."—Kirkus
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