Monday 15 December 2014

Guest Blogger ~ Piper Vaughn: The Working Elf Blues

Holiday Traditions
Hi, all! Thanks to NJ for having me on her blog today. :)

In my upcoming Christmas novelette, my main character, Wes, has a tradition of escaping to his secluded mountain cabin every December to spend the holiday season alone with his four sledding dogs. On Christmas Day, he cooks himself dinner, watches “Miracle on 34th Street,” and falls asleep in front of the fire. After growing up mainly in foster care, he has no family to speak of, and his tradition is a lonely one that Garnet, the elf in love with Wes, wishes to finally break by joining Wes for Christmas this year. Garnet literally crashes into Wes’s life and shakes everything up, inspiring him to start some new traditions, and bringing love and magic into his life at the same time.

My family’s traditions have changed over the years, as people moved away and others got closer. Typically we would gather at my parents’ house on Christmas Eve with various relatives for dinner, music, drinking, and some early gift-exchanging. In recent years, my mom started the tradition of buying the entire family coordinated pajamas and making us where them on Christmas day. We put them on, exchange our gifts, munch on food, watch movies, and just laze around the house all day. My mom does attend some church activities, but that isn’t something we do as a family. Mostly our family gatherings revolve around food. Which, hey, I’m not complaining. I’m a fan of good food. :D

Speaking of traditions, a personal one of mine is actually gorging on as many holiday-related stories as I can every November thru January. Christmas, Hanukkah, New Year’s Eve, Thanksgiving. If it takes place on a winter holiday, I can’t wait to get my hands on it. I’ve already read several, and I look forward to indulging for the rest of the month. 

Do you celebrate any holidays this time of year? If so, what are your traditions? Do you travel? Gather at a specific relative’s house? Take turns hosting? I always like hearing about what other people do. :)

~Piper

 
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Blurb:
Garnet Evergreen has never heard of an elf abandoning the North Pole for a human, but he yearns to be the first. Ever since he saw Wes, the boy with sorrowful eyes, Garnet felt an undeniable kinship. Over the years, he’s watched that boy grow into a man, and now he’s determined to give Wes a Christmas he’ll never forget. If only Garnet had thought to test his father’s sleigh before leaving…
Orphaned as a child, Wes spends every Christmas alone at his cabin. When he’s woken by a suspicious boom and finds a wrecked sleigh and an unconscious elf, he doesn’t know how to react. Wes isn’t fanciful. He doesn’t give much credence to the stories about Santa Claus and flying reindeer. But a part of him wants desperately to believe when Garnet promises forever, even if life has taught him that no one ever stays…

Author Bio:
Piper Vaughn wrote her first love story at eleven and never looked back. Since then, she’s known that writing in some form was exactly what she wanted to do. A reader at the core, Piper loves nothing more than getting lost in a great book—fantasy, young adult, romance, she loves them all (and has a two thousand book library to prove it!). She grew up in Chicago, in an ethnically diverse neighborhood, and loves to put faces and characters of every ethnicity in her stories, so her fictional worlds are as colorful as the real one. Above all, she believes that everyone needs a little true love in their life…even if it’s only in a book.

Visit Piper at

2 comments:

  1. I can't wait to read this story. I feel like I been waiting forever for it to come out.

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  2. I live in MA with my bf, but my family lives in PA, so one year I do Thanksgiving in MA and Xmas in PA, then the next year, I switch and do Xmas in MA and Thanksgiving in PA. I prefer Xmas in PA cuz we all go to my grandparents' house and they do potluck type of thing, and we hang out and eat whenever we feel like it and listen to Xmas music, open presents, etc. all day. We've done it that way since I was a kid, and I love it. My family makes some of my fave foods that I can't get up here in MA, so I tend to overdo it, but it's totally worth it. Plus my uncle has started a tradition of doing a meal at his house a couple of days before Xmas, and he's an amazing cook, so I always make sure I head down in time for his dinner too. It's amazing I don't need bigger pants til I go home to MA. lol

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