Wishin' and Hopin': A Christmas Story

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More About This Book

Overview

It's 1964 and ten-year-old Felix is sure of a few things: the birds and the bees are puzzling, television is magical, and this is one Christmas he'll never forget.

LBJ and Lady Bird are in the White House, Meet the Beatles is on everyone's turntable, and Felix Funicello (distant cousin of the iconic Annette!) is doing his best to navigate fifth grade—easier said than done when scary movies still give you nightmares and you bear a striking resemblance to a certain adorable cartoon boy.

Back in his beloved fictional town of Three Rivers, Connecticut, with a new cast of endearing characters, Wally Lamb takes his readers straight into the halls of St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School—where Mother Filomina's word is law and goody-two-shoes Rosalie Twerski is sure to be minding everyone's business. But grammar and arithmetic move to the back burner this holiday season with the sudden arrivals of substitute teacher Madame Frechette, straight from QuÉbec, and feisty Russian student Zhenya Kabakova. While Felix learns the meaning of French kissing, cultural misunderstanding, and tableaux vivants, Wishin' and Hopin' barrels toward one outrageous Christmas.

From the Funicello family's bus-station lunch counter to the elementary school playground (with an uproarious stop at the Pillsbury Bake-Off), Wishin' and Hopin' is a vivid slice of 1960s life, a wise and witty holiday tale that celebrates where we've been—and how far we've come.

Editorial Reviews

Kristi Lanier
Narrator Felix Funicello calls Wishin' and Hopin' his "act of contrition" for schoolboy transgressions. But in the hands of Wally Lamb, what emerges isn't an apology but a celebration of life—flawed, goofy, wonderful life…Felix makes a hilarious guide through a story that whirs right along.
—The Washington Post
Library Journal
In this charming departure for Lamb (The Hour I First Believed), feisty fifth grader Felix Funicello (yes, distant cousin to Annette) anticipates Christmas. It's 1964 in blue-collar Connecticut, and Felix worries that he's caused Sister Dymphna's mental breakdown. When the school's Christmas pageant rolls around, the school brownnoser and the new Russian girl duke it out over who gets to play Mary. Full of pop-culture references of the day (the Beatles, for example, as well as the Queen Mouseketeer), this will have broad appeal.
More Reviews (12) Fewer Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
Lightweight holiday fare in the entirely predictable subgenre of What Else Can Go Wrong at the Christmas Pageant?Lamb (The Hour I First Believed, 2008, etc.) takes half the novel just to get around to Yuletide. Up until that time, he lays sometimes laborious, sometimes lighthearted groundwork at the Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School of New London, Conn., in the fall of 1964. It seems that Sister Dymphna has had a serious emotional meltdown in front of her class, necessitating the arrival of fearsome but charismatic Madame Marguerite Frechette, a Quebecoise whose gifts include directing plays-or in this case a set of tableaux vivants for the school's Christmas production. Fifth-grader Felix Funicello is both narrator and imp of the perverse. And yes, his family is related to the renowned Annette Funicello, whose posters adorn the walls at the bus-depot lunch counter Felix's father runs. (At one point the boy has to confess to a priest that he French-kissed the sexy poster of Annette in her How to Stuff a Wild Bikini phase.) Bad luck stalks Felix like an obstinate shadow, especially as three big events are beginning to intersect in his life: the aforementioned Christmas program, his mother's appearance as a finalist in the Pillsbury Bake-Off (her recipe: Shepherd's Pie Italiano) and Felix's TV debut on The Ranger Andy Show. Readers obviously collude in the deal, for they know that nothing good will happen on any of these fronts. Sure enough, the pageant performers embarrass themselves and their parents with inappropriate off-the-cuff witticisms; Ma gets the trots during her appearance on Art Linkletter's show (the shepherd's pie burns); and Felix tells Ranger Andy an off-color joke that ofcourse is carried live on local networks. Our narrator has two foils here: the egregiously obnoxious Rosalie Twerski (aka "Turdski"), who desperately wants the part of Mary in the pageant, and the exotic Zhenya Kabakova, newly arrived from Russia and suspected (by Rosalie) of being a communist. Flimsy and barely entertaining.
Body and Soul
“Wishin’ and Hopin’ from Wally Lamb reminds us of what innocence was like.”
BookPage
We might as well call Wally Lamb the man with the golden pen...[Wishin’ and Hopin’] will leave you laughing and thinking nostalgically about your own school days and holidays past”
Columbus Dispatch
“Humorous and heartwarming…clever and well-written…A fun trip down memory lane from a skilled writer. The stocking stuffer might just become a cherished possession.”
Hartford Books Examiner
“Both heartwarming and laugh-out-loud funny…a cast of characters that are both uproarious and unforgettable…a poignant reminder that family and friends are the greatest gift of all.”
Houston Chronicle
“Lamb is a very good writer, and Wishin’ and Hopin’ is a charming read with a genuinely funny ending.”
Kansas City Star
“Warmly, sweetly retro”
Miami Herald
“Lamb’s vividly detailed portrait of the 1960’s and the inner workings of a Catholic schoolboy’s mind puts his first Christmas book on par with his previous three novels.”
Minneapolis Star Tribune
“Lamb’s rich panoply of details...render this novel first-rate escapism just begging for a comforter and a cup of tea.”
St. Petersburg Times
“Lamb gets Felix’s voice just right, and he does a spot-on job of evoking the special joys and trials of parochial school in the ‘60’s”
USA Today
“Lamb...proves he can be short, sweet and funny”
Washington Post
“In the hands of Wally Lamb, what emerges isn’t an apology but a celebration of life...Felix makes a hilarious guide through a story that whirs right along.”

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780061941009
  • Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
  • Publication date: 11/10/2009
  • Pages: 275
  • Sales rank: 694,913
  • Product dimensions: 5.40 (w) x 7.20 (h) x 1.20 (d)

Meet the Author

Wally Lamb
Wally Lamb

Wally Lamb is the author of the New York Times and national bestseller The Hour I First Believed, as well as the novels She's Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True, both #1 New York Times bestsellers and Oprah's Book Club selections. He lives in Connecticut with his family.

Biography

The desire to write fiction hit Wally Lamb comparatively late in life. He was in his 30s, living in Connecticut, working as a high school English teacher, and relishing his role as a brand new father, when he began his first story. As he worked his way through several drafts, he was suddenly struck by how little he knew of the writer's craft. Determined to improve his skills, he enrolled in the M.F.A. program at Vermont College.

Lamb blossomed at Vermont, where he learned two important and liberating lessons from his teacher and mentor Gladys Swann: (1.) Never write with a particular audience in mind; write for yourself, and let the audience find you. (2.) There's no such thing as an original story; the writer's job is to recast a familiar tale in his or her own way. Acting on Swann's advice, he immersed himself in mythology and reread the works of Joseph Campbell and Heinrich Zimmer.

In 1992, eight years after completing graduate school, Lamb published his first novel. The story of a tremendously overweight woman who triumphs over a lifetime of misery, pain, and abuse, She's Come Undone became a surprise bestseller, and several publications, including The New York Times, placed it on their year-end "best of" lists. Then, in 1997, kingmaker Oprah Winfrey selected it for her prestigious Book Club, catapulting Lamb into the literary limelight.

By the time he received Oprah's endorsement, Lamb was nearly finished with his second novel. Published in 1998, I Know This Much Is True garnered rave reviews for its sensitive portrayal of twin brothers, one of whom suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. To Lamb's surprise, Oprah beckoned a second time, praising his sophomore effort with these admiring words: "It's not just a book, it's a life experience."

Lamb is tremendously grateful for the boost the Oprah experience has given his career. "It opened me up to so many more millions of readers I might not have had," he told USA Today, "but it's also a double-edged sword." At best a painstakingly slow writer, he found himself crippled by writer's block, choking on the pressure to produce a worthy third novel. "I had all those Oprah readers with their expectations in my writing room. I had to open my office door and shoo everybody's expectations out of there." The process took nearly a decade, but finally, in 2008, Lamb published The Hour I First Believed, an ambitious epic that touches on a rich ragout of sociopolitical themes, including the Columbine killings, Hurricane Katrina, and the Iraq War.

In addition to his own work, Lamb has edited two bestselling anthologies of writing authored by inmates at York Correctional Institute, the maximum security women's prison in Niantic, Connecticut, where he began teaching in 1999. Lamb speaks lovingly of his students, some of whom have evolved into wonderful writers. The first anthology, Couldn't Keep It to Myself: Testimonies from Our Imprisoned Sisters, was published in 2003 to great critical acclaim and earned for one of the inmates the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award. It also became the center of legal controversy. Following publication, the State of Connecticut attempted to sue the women authors -- not for the modest earnings the book would net them after they left prison, but for the entire cost of their incarceration: $117 a day! The suit was settled, thanks to the intervention of sympathetic officials, legislators, and journalists. In 2007, Lamb published I'll Fly Away, a second anthology of the York inmates' writing.

Good To Know

Raised in a blue-collar corner of Connecticut, Lamb grew up in the looming shadow of Norwich State Hospital, a sprawling facility for the mentally ill. Now closed, the institution played a part in Lamb's family history. As an adult, Lamb learned that the grandfather he had never known had been locked up in the hospital for a violent attack on his wife. He later discovered that his grandfather had died of brain cancer and wondered if illness had provoked the violence. Unsurprisingly, the themes of incarceration and mental illness play important roles in his stories.

    1. Hometown:
      Willimantic, Connecticut
    1. Date of Birth:
      October 17, 1950
    2. Place of Birth:
      Norwich, Connecticut
    1. Education:
      B.A. in Education, University of Connecticut, 1972; M.A. in Education, 1977; M.F.A. in Writing, Vermont College, 1984

Customer Reviews

Average Rating 4
( 183 )

Rating Distribution

5 Star

(64)

4 Star

(51)

3 Star

(38)

2 Star

(18)

1 Star

(12)

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See All Sort by: Showing 1 – 20 of 183 Customer Reviews

  • Posted November 12, 2009

    Run Don't Walk

    When you are reading Wally Lamb's lastest book you will smile all of the time and laugh out loud half of the time. Did you attend Catholic grade school during the 1960's? Then run don't walk to the book store and pick up this delightful Christmas treasure. Wonderful stocking stuffer. Mr. Lamb kept this book under 275 pages. Wally if you read these reviews, please bring us more stories about Felix and his family.

    7 out of 9 people found this review helpful.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted November 19, 2009

    I Also Recommend:

    9780670021369

    A new Christmas classic!

    It's a charming book. I have always enjoyed Wally Lamb's other books and it was quite refreshing to have something so humorous from him. While I never attended parochial schools, I feel that I know what one is like from the book. It has a real charm about it and will become one of my annual Christmas traditions. Happy Holidays Everybody!

    3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted November 15, 2009

    Charming and full of the human comedy

    Set in New London, CT in 1964, this story portrays family, from the child's viewpoint, at its best -- loving, supportive, and full of hope. Wally Lamb captures and seamlessly presents the reality of a more innocent time and warms our hearts with laughter and appreciation in the process. A wonderful book.

    3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted October 17, 2010

    more from this reviewer

    humorous hysterical historical

    Looking back over years to In December 1964 when Cassius Clay and the Beatles were kings, Felix Funicello, whose family's claim to fame is being a third cousin to Mickey's Annette, attended the St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School in Connecticut. A fifth grader at the time, he, with the help of twice left back Lonny Flood, caused the meltdown (back then we said nervous breakdown) of their teacher Sisters Dymphna. At the time Felix, the smallest child in the fifth grade was going on Ronald Reagan's TV show Ranger Andy as a Junior Midshipmen and his mom was participating in the TV Pillsbury Bake Off show.

    The school is doing a Christmas play production while the newest student is Russian tomboy Zhenya Kabakova who competed with the boys in their sports like dodgeball and "bezbull." All the students assumed she is a Soviet spy. Felix who was ranked as the second best student knew he could never catch the #1 Rosalie Twerski because she worked the teachers. When his mom melted down on TV frightening the host Reagan, Felix vows to save the family honor. Looking like the comic strip character Dondi, he goes on Ranger Andy and tells a dirty joke that turns Reagan's face red. However, it is the shenanigans involving the Christmas play that will go down in parochial school infamy.

    This humorous hysterical historical tale targets two prime groups though other readers will appreciate the pranks too. Young adults will root for the feisty almost famous Felix and nostalgic boomers like me (elementary school student at the time) who know Annette by her first name and remember the Louisville Lip before he became Ali. Wally Lamb provides an engaging look at 1964, a pivotal year in American culture with the British invasion and our first environmentally conscious politician Lady Bird beautifying America. This is a winner.

    Harriet Klausner

    2 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted December 28, 2011

    Fun read!

    If you would like to venture into the world of a fifth grade boy going through his family and school life this is a must read! Wally Lamb captures the mind of child perfectly and hilariously. I giggled out loud on every page, in every chapter! This is a light hearted book I will read over and over again.

    1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

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  • Posted November 30, 2010

    more from this reviewer

    Life as a 5th grade boy in 1964, fun memories!

    It's 1964, LBJ and Lady Bird are in the White House, Meet the Beatles is on everyone's turntable, and ten-year-old Felix Funicello (distant cousin to Annette!) is doing his best to navigate fifth grade - easier said than done when scary movies still give you nightmares and you bear a striking resemblance to a certain adorable cartoon character boy.

    But there are still several things young Felix can depend on: the birds and the bees are puzzling, television is magical, and this is one Christmas he's never going to forget.

    In Wally Lambs Christmas story, Wishin' and Hopin', we get a birds eye view of the life of Felix Funicello who attends a Catholic school, St. Aloysius Gonzaga Parochial School. He personally feels responsible for one of his teachers, Sister Dymphna, melt down, will always be second to Rosalie Twerski who out does him in everything from making cardboard display boards for Literature and English grammar rules as well as her constant souvenirs from her vacation spots that are shared in Science class and remains number one in the class..

    This at a time when Russians were believed to be communists, his mother is about to be on national TV for the Pillsbury baking contest finals, and he is trying to fit in with the rest of the boys in the fifth grade.

    To read all about Felix's confession, you'll have to check this wonderful book out. I have to warn readers that there is profanity and some strong subject matter when dealing with what 5th grade boys are thinking about during this stage of their life.

    I received this book compliments of TLC Book Tours for my honest review and have to say for the most part I loved it. My hubby and I took turns comparing notes from our childhood to Felix's and some of the things he said were very memorable. I would rate this book a 4 out of 5 stars just for the language and subject matter but otherwise it's a great story.

    1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted December 7, 2009

    A charmer

    I read this book quickly, as I do all of Mr Lamb's books...I was thrilled to see another book out so soon from him! It was charming, and like all his books, his narrative feels authentic. She's Come Undone has been my favorite book since it was first chosen for Oprah's book club, and I've read them all and love them all. This is a quick, easy, enjoyable read, and I can't wait for the next one!!!

    1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted February 24, 2012

    Funny funny funny

    So well written you forget it's a novel

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  • Posted January 22, 2012

    Hearwarming Read

    I was a child during the middle of the last century. Reading Wishin' and Hopin' is like revisiting those years. Love the characters. The book was funny and also touched my heart. I enjoyed it so much I bought another copy of this ebook for a gift to a very good friend.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 21, 2012

    Very entertaining!!!

    Very quick but highly entertsing read. Laugh outloud funny and is a great representation of parochial school life!!

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  • Posted January 18, 2012

    Highly Recommended!

    A witty, lighthearted, reflection of your childhood! The Sandlot, A Christmas Story, and The Best Christmas Pageant Ever come together to for an entertaining story written with amazing voice and imagery! Your will enjoy this book during Christmas vacation or Summer vacation!

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  • Posted January 18, 2012

    Very entertaining, laugh out loud funny

    Very funny coming of age story (not recommended for younger readers, unfortunately). This story could replace the "Christmas Story" my son insists we watch every year.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 18, 2012

    Great quick holiday read.

    Great quick holiday read. Funny and nostalgic.

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  • Posted January 12, 2012

    Loved this...a great Christmas surprise!

    Found this book in the aisle of Big Lots. Recognized Wally Lamb's name because I'd read "I Know This Much is True" and "She's Come Undone". Couldn't live without this one.

    What a wonderful Christmas surprise. I couldn't put it down and such a comfort while I was enduring jury duty as a juror in a capital murder trial. During our long hours in the jury room, I finished this awesome Christmas book.

    I am now reading again!

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  • Posted January 11, 2012

    too funny

    The only problem was that I couldn't read it in bed, because I kept waking my husband up with my laughing! A true "LOL" book.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 9, 2012

    Good, but not great

    Enjoyed it, but didn't love it.

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 7, 2012

    Cute Little Sttory

    This is cute, little story. Funny! Not the usual Wally Lamb excellence, but worth the few hours it takes to read it!

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 5, 2012

    True Wally Lamb

    If you love Wally Lamb, you'll love Wishin' and Hopin'. Quick and fun read!

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  • Anonymous

    Posted January 2, 2012

    A Feel-Good Christmas Story

    This was a great Christmas story! It made me laugh out loud and smile. After just directing a Christmas program, I found that section in the book a hoot! The characters were well-written, and I wasn't disappointed by this story from Mr. Lamb.

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  • Posted December 29, 2011

    Entertaining

    This is a great, cute read around Christmastime. It's different from Lamb's other books in that it is a light-hearted, quirky tale reminiscent of A Christmas Story. I really enjoyed this quick read.

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