REVIEW: Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman
A sentimental advertising creative and a blunt, no-nonsense bar owner find a second chance at love while binge-watching iconic holiday movies in this poignant and heartwarming romance, from the author of Charm City Rocks and All Together Now.
The new year had barely begun when Grace White and Henry Adler both lost their spouses. Now, nearly a year later, the first holiday season since their “Great and Terrible Sadnesses” approaches. Although their mothers scheme to matchmake the two surviving spouses, it’s clear that neither is ready to date again. Yet no one understands what they are going through better than each other, and a delicate friendship is born.
When Henry sees an ad for a Christmas movie marathon—once an annual tradition for him and his wife—Grace offers to watch some films with him, despite her aversion to a few of his picks. Her two young kids, Ian and Bella, also join in whenever possible—bedtimes permitting, of course.
With each movie, Grace and Henry’s shared grief eases as they start to see a life beyond the sadness. But as they draw closer, other romantic possibilities leave them uncertain about their future together. Is their bond merely the result of loneliness and shared circumstances, or have they found something that’s worth taking a shot at . . . again?
CW/TW – both main characters have lost a spouse in the past year and are dealing with grief.
“Wow,” I say. “I forgot that’s how it starts.”
“Henry, are . . . are we Charlie Brown?”
“I think we might be.”
Dear Mr. Norman,
Two years ago (yikes!) I was charmed by “Charm City Rocks” and yes, I made that bad pun deliberately. I saw this book would be coming out and jumped at the chance to read it. Fair warning to readers about the fact that Henry and Grace are both grieving the loss of their spouses and discuss this between themselves so grief, sadness, and some depression are mentioned.
Grace lost her husband to cancer while Henry’s wife died in a plane crash. Almost immediately after Tim’s funeral, Grace, Ian, and Bella went and got a dog from the SPCA. That sounds heartless but Tim was allergic and urged Grace to do this and to get a mutt because purebreds are for assholes. Harry Styles is delightful and a wonderful addition to the book. Harry Styles the dog, I mean.
Henry is at his parent’s house far too much, something his mom gently but firmly makes clear to him. It’s been almost a year, she knows First Holidays are going to be rough but really Henry needs to spend less time with them. With that in mind, she sets up a meeting with the daughter of a book club member so Henry and Grace have a painfully awkward meeting. But they discover that talking about their losses and grief stages actually helps a little. Will they discover more to their relationship or are they building on sand?
“Mommed?”
“They mommed us, didn’t they?”
The deadpan (oops, another bad, bad pun) humor, Ian and Bella, Harry Styles, Grace’s bar family (don’t worry, she owns it), Henry’s brother Cal and Cal’s ‘always in a Bjornbaby’ daughter are all wonderful. Once again, the city of Baltimore is almost a character and is lovingly described by someone who knows it. Holy heck I’ve just looked at images of Baltimore’s “Miracle on 34th Street” and damn I want to see that live.
“Yeah, this kinda tacky needs to be experienced in person,” I say.
I like that Henry and Grace are not perfect. I like that Henry is initially hesitant about Grace’s lovely (and NOT plot moppet) children because what childless man is instantly at ease with a six year old and an eleven year old? The bonding comes slowly but is helped along the way by art and mice.
“Of course you can,” I say, going with the first one, because maybe he’s had enough reality lately.
The holiday movies that are mentioned are great and well chosen to fit into the current narrative going on in that scene. Henry and Grace know their holiday movies and while they agree on much, there are disagreements as well. The scene at Grace’s workplace with an entire bar of people gleefully quoting from “Elf” is hysterical.
“Your cases against The Family Stone and Love Actually,” I say. “I need to hear them immediately.”
Grace ‘talking’ to Tim is odd at first but Grace has got it down pat now and can discuss her day and problems with him – or so she says. Henry’s one instance of a conversation with Brynn occurs after Henry makes a classic mistake while trying to fix a light socket but it had me crying a little anyway. At first, yeah, I was worried about a book featuring two grieving MCs (I pretty much skipped reading the blurb before asking to read the book so this is on me) but it’s been roughly a year for each of them and they begin more as friends and grief buddies. Talking with someone who knows helps them plus Grace is seeing a therapist, too. They are both being urged by family to consider getting out there but thankfully aside from the two book club moms’ first effort, none of them pushes harder than Henry or Grace is ready for.
The pacing is well done and even though the majority of the book occurs over a bit more than a month, I felt these two had gone through depths. Had bonded over shared love and disdain of holiday movies (Die Hard is a holiday movie and parts of Love Actually are problematic). But maybe Tim and Brynn and everything were too perfect?
It’s such a personal question, but she’s in her pajamas, rubbing her feet together in their fluffy wool socks, so it somehow feels natural—like we’ve skipped a few steps in getting to know each other.
“We talked about it a lot,” I say. “Eventually we decided we were happy enough being just us.”
Grace slow blinks. “So, you were just gonna spend the rest of your lives bathing in money and doing whatever the hell you wanted?”
“That was the plan.”
“Monsters,” she whispers.
Then something happens and I am like no, no, no, no, no, no I don’t want my feeling of too perfect stepped on after all.
Spoiler: Show
“I think it’s this one,” someone says. “So, who the hell’s Henry again?” someone else asks. “And why didn’t she just call him? It’s snowing.” Another guy yells, “Global warming, huh? Well, I’m freezing my ass off!” Then a woman shouts, “You’re talking about weather, not climate, you jackass!”
My dad is at the window now. “Um,” he says.
“What’s going on?” my mom asks.
“So, yeah, there are about twenty-five people outside,” he says. “Oh, and a dog, too.”
The ending though. Happy sigh. Happy laughter. Happiness and I am like yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. The movies, the family, the mice, the dog, the snow, the neighbor’s face-planting decorative elf, the art, the bar party, the heavy metal Christmas music at The Horse You Came In On, Baltimore, and the relationship are so wonderful and made me smile. A-
~Jayne
“See, Henry,” says Ian. “Everybody loves Elf.”
In Baltimore, Maryland, Miracle on 34th Street is a display of holiday lights that takes place annually on the 700 block of 34th Street (between Chestnut Avenue and Keswick Road in Baltimore’s Hampden community. The display, which involves the residents of most of the houses on the block (with three-story rowhouses on the north side of the street and two-story ones with second-floor bay windows on the south side), started in 1947 (the same year that its namesake movie debuted), and takes place between late November and late December. The location becomes a major attraction for visitors from all over the area. ~ Wikipedia
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Well, this definitely sounds appealing! Thanks for bringing it to my attention, Jayne.
Thank you for the review! I loved Matthew Norman’s Charm City and am now anxious to read Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie. I will, alas, have to wait for a sale.
Any recommendations for a library system with a robust budget and aversion to censorship? I can think of worse reasons to move than to live within a good library system again. I appreciated my good libraries when I had them, but I didn’t realize they weren’t nationwide.
@LML: My library is pretty good at buying ebook requests but I’ve noticed over the past 1-2 years that they aren’t buying quite as much as they used to. They’ve also had to cut down on the amount of monthly Hoopla loans we have.
@Kareni: My first Norman read was a ‘what-the-heck’ this sounds good gamble so I was definitely looking to see when he’d publish a new one.
@LML: If you read ebooks, Los Angeles Public Library has an amazing selection. It also offers digital access to the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, and multiple apps / options for movies, music, language learning, and online courses. The selection of print books varies from branch to branch (there are a lot of branches) but tends to be less popular fiction oriented. That’s okay, though, because Los Angeles County has its own library system, with multiple branches and a great focus on popular fiction in print.
LA has incorporated towns like Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, El Segundo and others with their own library systems and that offer cards to city residents and often state residents too. The last time I checked LAPL’s card was available to all California residents if they could show up in person to pick it up. Some of these cards self-renew as well. It is a book lover’s paradise, and they are as anti-censorship as can be.
@Janine, thank you! Somehow when thinking about libraries with budgets my mind meanders up and down the east coast. I might like southern California.
I am conducting a one-woman boycott of ebooks from libraries. I remain indignant since learning that library ebook check-outs are rationed by publishers. I have some resources to purchase books, so I wait for sales, grumble, and think about moving.
The Washington, DC library system has reciprocity across state lines with the library systems in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties in Maryland. I was disappointed when I found out that even though my son and his family have a Princeton, NJ mailing address, they don’t live in Princeton proper so can’t use the library there. It mystifies me that they can’t borrow books within the same state in a bordering town, while I can borrow books from miles away in another state.
And yes, it’s perverse that ebooks may actually have a more limited life than a physical book. Publishers ration the digital ones, but once a library purchases a print books, it can be lent until it falls apart or gets stolen (as, sadly, sometimes happens).
@LML: I know that about library ebooks, it sucks. But if I’m not mistaken, libraries use their circulation numbers (as well as their number of patrons) to apply for grants, so it’s not all a loss. Then, too, driving to the library takes a greater toll on the environment. And there are ebooks I can’t afford to purchase but getting them from the library does give authors a little bit of royalties. Maybe these are all rationalizations but I don’t think I could live without library ebooks (and other digital materials).
This does look good Jayne!
Loved it except for the SPOILER part, which was unnecessary IMO. Liked the quick shout-out to Charm City Rocks.
@SusanS: Yep, I caught the CCR moment. The only thing I can think of for the spoiler in the book was to get Grace to finally move on emotionally.