Jonathan Toomey

When I was in college, I worked at Deseret Book.  I was taken in by the cover of a new children's Christmas book one year, The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey by Susan Wojciechowski.

It's a story of a wood carver, Toomey, who suffers from the loss of a wife and child, and Thomas and his mother who ask the carver to carve a Nativity set to replace one they've lost.

It's full of beautiful prose that is better read aloud--the sounds of the vowels and the cadence is meant to be performed, as many great children's books are. Illustrations, by P.J. Lynch are also fantastic.

The book can't be more than 24 pages, but loses nothing for its brevity.  I had it in my head that I would make a great movie of the book one day, but discovered today that someone beat me to it.  And now there are musical versions playing on stage, including at SCERA in Orem.

This version adds music, about a dozen characters, and about 90 minutes, but adds nothing in the way of connection to the main characters or emotion to the story.

Do yourself a favor--read this book.