Papa Noel

Anton Noel has a Christmas name and no use for Christmas. The former Air Force pararescueman figures adopting a family for the holidays means buying what's on the list and leaving it at the door. Then he meets Sunny McCay — widowed, broke, raising four-year-old twins on a secondhand sewing machine, and stubbornly full of a joy he can't explain. What Anton doesn't know is why she came to Bayou Mambaloa.

Four years ago, Sunny survived the wreck that killed her husband. She saw the face of the...