When the Heart Brings You Home, A Connor Falls Christmas Collection, is a heartwarming collection of three holiday novellas, all set in the small town of Connor Falls, Pennsylvania during the Christmas season, and each a story of family and love with a touch of romance.
Winter Light – a troubled little girl brings the Christmas Spirit back to her struggling single father and the woman he once kissed many years ago.
Light the Heart Home – two sisters with secrets reunite at Christmas, prodding old wounds and finding healing love.
Home for the Holidays – all Susan Hardwick wants is to find her way back home.
I’m thinking most people who are reading this post have heard of the movie, Practical Magic, and many have watched it. I could be wrong, however. I often am.
Practical Magic is one of my “go to” movies: I spot it on a listing and, boom, I’m there. It’s not just Sandra Bullock, whom I adore, or Nicole Kidman’s troubled character. It’s not the adorable, fatherless daughters of Ms. Bullock’s character or the delightful performances of Stockard Channing and Dianne Wiest. It’s not even the delicious Aidan Quinn or the dark and dangerous character of the equally delicious Goran Visnjic, although as a whole they all do bring this movie together in a way that keeps me coming back again and again. (By the way, the film is based on a novel by Alice Hoffman—a book I have not read, but which should be on my TBR list, considering my attachment to the movie.)
There is a reason I am bringing up this film. If you’ve seen it, I am betting you recall the strength of its female characters together; in fact, of all the women in the community when they band as one in the end. It is a witches’ coven at its fictional best. It is what I thought of at my most recent book signing, at the fantastic local bookstore called Let’s Play Books in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, a bookstore owned, run, hosted, imagined, loved and fulfilled by women.
I was greeted and immediately welcomed into the community that exists within this bookstore. For those few hours in which I was there, I was reminded of the particular solidarity of women, the magic than can and does exist between us. (I’m not saying anything bad about you boys out there, lol, and I’m sure you have your own version of what I’m describing.)
Laughter existed in copious quantities, and not at anyone’s expense, as well as tales of books we’ve read, life experiences we shared, our love of mice (well, two of us, anyway), future plans, joy, sadness, common ground. Yet it seemed more than that. A particular strength manifested from the togetherness. Not a threatening strength, a nurturing one. All that in two hours with people who had, up until that point, been strangers. They didn’t feel like strangers. Not from the moment we met. They felt like part of a connected whole that had always been.
Yes, like magic. Brilliant magic. Practical magic.
I believe in magic, and this is the very best kind.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
First published by Warner Books’ Popular Library, Robin Maderich has written numerous romance novels, from historical to contemporary paranormal, as Robin Maderich, Celia Ashley and Alyssa Deane. Ms. Maderich resides in Pennsylvania, the locale and inspiration for many of her stories. She is an avid fan of historical fact and fiction, as well as the infinite realm of possibilities.
RiverMoose-Reads 
Thank you so much for hosting my guest post on your wonderful blog!
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Thank you for letting me! I’m glad I was able to be part of your book tour!
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