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The Genre Holder
Ex-Mas Song follows a man who survives a suicide attempt and wakes to face his failures, toxic attachment, fractured family life, and desperate need for recovery. At what point did you know this would become a Christmas story?
This project began as a dare from my then second wife to write a meta-fiction story like the film Adaptation, directed by Spike Jonze and written by Charlie Kaufman (portrayed by Nicolas Cage in the movie), who writes about his problems scripting a non-fiction book into a metaphysical meta-mess of a comedy. My first thought was, “Well, what would I write about?” The answer became what was going on around me during Christmas. That became the starting point, but I spun my wheels on it until I came up with an idea for a structure: mimic A Christmas Carol. Since mental health, suicide ideation, addiction, and recovery play such a prominent role in my life’s history and experience, that became the idea, and A Christmas Carol became the genre holder, so to speak. “Cont;nue” became a subtheme for the book.
Faith is central to the novel, but the journey feels more like wrestling than preaching. Was that balance important to you?
My faith became the cornerstone that made my redemption possible. However, after it happens, it’s no longer about me, but about helping others. After I began to let God reshape my life, I began to serve others more. In order to serve, you have to talk to people and listen to their stories. The opportunity came to help lead a faith-based twelve-step program, which is about “walking the talk”, yielding oneself for service, or living out the Serenity Prayer. The Lord’s Prayer and the Serenity Prayer are my cornerstones to sobriety and sanity. There is no use in preaching those prayers. One must live them out for them to be of any use. Words are meaningless without being connected to action and the motives of the heart. When the right words match the right motives, miracles can happen!
The psychiatric ward is portrayed with both pain and humanity. How important was it to avoid stereotypes?
There were no stereotypes since most of it was based on first-hand experience; Grandpa’s Ghost, Boz, and the Merry Prankster were meta-add-ins from A Christmas Carol (Boz) structure. The closest literary experience that I have come across regarding a psychiatric ward would be One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, by Ken Kesey (the Merry Prankster), which I read after my own experience. I would like to add that some reviewers and readers have mixed reactions to Blair (which can translate to “battlefield”). Your review was very sympathetic. Hint: she represents the PAST, and as we all know, the Past Doesn’t Change: it’s a Dead End. The Serenity Prayer helps me to deal with the past and to focus on the here and now as I head toward the future.
What is the next book you are working on, and when will it be available?
I have two ongoing concerns. The older and longer project is a Mark Twain meets Jules Verne steam balloon adventure. A grandfather tinkerer makes a balloon for one last adventure, only to discover his granddaughter has stowed away, and shenanigans ensue. I am about three-fourths done with a draft, but since I revise as I go along, I doubt this will be finished and published in 2027.
The other ongoing project is my latest serial on Substack. Breaking Grin’s Law is a Gothic mystery, an alchemical comedy with an ensemble cast. Set in 1803 Heidelberg, Germany, two orphaned brothers, Sebastian and Karl Grin, work at a rare book store and attend University during the night, and solve bizarre occult mysteries at night. The serial comes out at the end of every month, covering the brothers’ adventure in the form of a principle that is experienced or discovered. I am halfway done with this project. The latest installment is June’s “Send in the Golem,” which is available here.
Once the serial is complete, it will form the next installment of the 13 short story collection, which I hope to publish sometime in 2027, so to speak. “Cont;nue” became a subtheme for the book.
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Ex-Mas Song
Ex-Mas Song follows Justin R., a man who survives a suicide attempt during a snowstorm and wakes into a Christmas-haunted reckoning with his failures, his toxic attachment to Blair, his fractured family life, and his need for recovery. The novel moves through a psychiatric ward, painful memory, spiritual confrontation, and Dickensian visitations until Christmas becomes less a holiday than an autopsy of the heart, and, finally, a chance to choose life.
I found the book emotionally raw in a way that feels deliberately unpolished at the edges. Justin’s voice is funny, bitter, wounded, and frequently self-lacerating; he jokes because the alternative is to collapse. The Christmas references pile up almost like snowdrifts, songs, sweets, movies, scripture, old family rituals, and that abundance gives the novel its strange pulse. It can be messy, but the mess has intention. The story understands that despair is rarely neat, and recovery often begins in the least ceremonial places: an ER curtain, a locked ward, a stale room, a remembered plate of fudge.
I liked the way the book refuses to make healing sentimental. Blair isn’t simply a villain, Justin isn’t simply a victim, and the psychiatric ward is not merely a setting for misery. Everyone is carrying some private corrosion. The Christian framework is explicit and central, but the strongest moments are not sermons; they are moments of recognition, when Justin sees how much of his life has been governed by appetite, fear, resentment, and bad bargains. The prose can swing from comic riff to apocalyptic vision in a single breath, and while that tonal volatility may not suit every reader, it gives the book a feverish, singular energy.
This book is best for readers of Christian fiction, inspirational fiction, and contemporary spiritual drama, especially those who appreciate stories about suicide recovery, addiction, toxic relationships, forgiveness, and faith-based transformation. Readers who love A Christmas Carol will recognize the structure immediately, though this feels closer in grit and confession to a recovery-room answer to Dickens than a cozy retelling. Ex-Mas Song is a bruised Christmas carol for anyone who has mistaken survival for defeat.
Pages: 486 | ASIN : B0CNJKZJ3F
A Christmas Carol
![A Christmas Carol: (Retold by Norman Whaler and Illustrated by Bianca Milacic) by [Whaler, Norman]](https://i0.wp.com/images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51e7HlfXu2L.jpg?resize=321%2C416&ssl=1)
Norman Whaler’s A Christmas Carol is an exceptional retelling of a classic Christmas story. The story of stingy and selfish old Scrooge who learns through a series of ghostly visits that he has the power to ease the suffering of others and bring joy to those around him.
Norman Whaler tells this story in short rhymes that were spot on every time. The rhythm’s were short and succinct but still summed up the expanded story perfectly. Each page is accompanied by high quality art that supports the narrative and fits the book’s tone. The art is so good that I wanted to see more of it. I felt like some of the paragraphs, because they summarized so much of the story, could have been on another page with it’s own art to give life to what was being told. But this is a critique that comes out of the desire to see more of the exceptional artwork already displayed.
This is a retelling of a classic Christmas story that highlights Christian themes throughout the book with a deft touch. At the end of the book readers are treated to bonus material in the way of Christmas sheet music. I can imagine that this book would be a nice way to start a Christmas night with the family, with a story followed by songs.
If you love Christmas stories, especially the classic one of Scrooge, you will want to pick this up for the young readers in your home.
Pages: 34 | ASIN: B07QF4BPKG
Tiny Tim and the Ghost of Ebenezer Scrooge – Audiobook
Tiny Tim is all grown up, and everything he loves and holds dear has been ripped from him. Upon the death of his dear friend, Ebenezer Scrooge, Tiny Tim begins to question each of his beliefs and the very faith that had been instilled in his family with the love of Scrooge himself years ago. Tim, now an adult, is faced with the loss of another of his dear loves, Becky. As fate would have it, Becky is simultaneously suffering through the most trying time of her young life on the streets with her young son and no place to lay their heads. Just as fate intervened fourteen years ago in the form of Ebenezer Scrooge, fate lays its hand on upon Tim once more.
Norman Whaler has crafted a beautiful tale of faith, hope, and love in his sequel to Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. Tiny Tim and the Ghost of Ebenezer Scrooge – Audiobook details the events surrounding and immediately following the death of an aged Ebenezer Scrooge. Tim Cratchit, once the young crippled boy benefiting from Scrooge’s change of heart in A Christmas Carol, is impacted most of all by Scrooge’s death.
From beginning to end, Whaler’s sequel to the beloved classic pays homage to the original plot and the beautiful transformation made by its key character, Ebenezer Scrooge. Though Tiny Tim, now all grown up, is the title character, he also exhibits a change of heart similar to that of Scrooge. Tim fights a battle within himself as he struggles to regain his faith. Whaler does a phenomenal job of adhering to the feel of the original book with his references to Scrooge’s character transformation. The reader watches as Tim fights a similar battle and, ultimately, wins with Scrooge’s help.
As a fan of the original tale of Scrooge and the Cratchits, I could not help but fall in love with the parallel story line and the magic of three as it again reared its head in Tim’s life. The sound quality and voice over is exceptional in this audiobook and delivers this lovely story in a clear and crisp manner. Scrooge’s reappearance from the afterlife is expected but quite fitting. Whaler has done Dickens proud with this quick read rich with character development and steeped with faith.
Duration: 1 hour 54 minutes | ASIN: B01NAJJLXP
Tiny Tim and the Ghost of Ebenezer Scrooge
![Tiny Tim and The Ghost of Ebenezer Scrooge: The sequel to A Christmas Carol by [Whaler, Norman]](https://i0.wp.com/images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51ZW4IoqGXL.jpg?resize=313%2C432&ssl=1)
It takes a bold artist to follow up a masterpiece. Far too often, the original creators can’t even recapture a work’s magic in its sequel. Sometimes though, the most devoted admirers are up to the task. Norman Whaler’s Tiny Tim and the Ghost of Ebenezer Scrooge – The Sequel to A Christmas Carol might be derivative, but it’s derivative in all the right ways. Whaler knows he’s trying to extend Dickens classic, and he succeeds.
Whaler opens his sequel by briefly summarizing the ending of A Christmas Carol – which quickly helps ground any readers who haven’t read it recently. Here, we see right away that Whaler makes the smart decision to evoke Dickens rather than imitate him. He echos Dickens’ source of tension in the characters’ lives: for crippling poverty still grips this corner of London. And with the newly philanthropic Ebenezer Scrooge now deceased, the citizens again find themselves facing an English winter without money for food or clothing.
My favorite part of the reading was hearing more from the side characters whose voices drive the plot. Unfortunately, the illustrations that start each chapter vary wildly in terms of style and medium. They all match the subject of the story well, but fail to match each other. Some appear hand drawn while others have been made on a computer. Even just applying the same filter to each illustration would have helped unify the novel.
Whaler clearly admires and respects Dickens, but I do think he missed out on an opportunity to be a little more self referential with the sequel – Dickens might very well have appreciated just such humor. Regardless, the voice and tone that first made this Christmas classic are there in full force. If you read the conclusion of Dickens’ original to your children while a cold winter blast beasts against the frame of the house, they might just turn up toward you and ask, as so many readers have over the decades, “what happens next?” In such an event, you now know where to turn.
Pages: 96 | ASIN: B076YGMGF9
