The Reviews for “An Off-White Christmas” by Donald G. Evans have been pouring in, and people love it…
With offhand grace and humor, Evans captures the characters’ burning desires to escape from in-between stages of their lives and their disappointment at the outcome. Illustrations by Hannah Jennings throughout the book resemble ornaments that could hang on a Christmas tree.
Katie Burns, Newcity Lit
The stories in Don Evans’s excellent collection, An Off-White Christmas, are full of witty, humane moments, vivid characters and settings that range from Chicago to Syracuse to Las Vegas. The people you’ll meet here are your friends, your neighbors, your relatives—in all their flawed beauty and pathos. This book is not to be missed.
Christine Sneed, author of Little Known Facts and Portraits of a Few of the People I’ve Made Cry
Don Evans can get the streets to talk as if they’re telling their own stories. One hears in his work an immediately recognizable offhand tone that rings true, empathetic, street smart, and very funny.
Stuart Dybek, author of A Neighborhood and Other Stories, The Coast of Chicago, I Sailed with Magellan, Streets in Their Own Ink, Paper Lanterns, and Ecstatic Cahoots
Donald Evans has a great ear and a light touch and together they lead An Off-White Christmas in unpredictable directions. Underlying what’s funny in these stories are real families, friends and lovers colliding or coming together in what promises, but doesn’t always turn out to be, the season of good cheer.
Rosellen Brown, author of Street Games, Before and After, Half a Heart and others
While many Christmas-themed stories rely on warm-fuzzies, Evans’s debut collection evokes empathy through his narrators’ flaws, ambitions, and heartaches. For some of them, the holidays offer time to reflect on relationships past. Planning to surprise his parents for Christmas, the gay narrator in “Almost” reconciles a recent breakup when his train is stalled five minutes from home. In “One Person’s Garbage,” a woman bids on Christmas knickknacks at an auction, recalling the childhood celebrations she hid from her liberal parents. Other characters use the holidays to consider their futures. In “Bah!” a hungover, onceaspiring actor forswears the stage, if only he can convince his director that this performance of A Christmas Carol is his last. And in the charming title story, Ma and her ne’er-do-well son, Willie, compete in finding the best deal on a Christmas tree, until the year Pa dies, when Willie has a new role to fill. Lovingly illustrated by Chicago artist Hannah Jennings, Evans’s 12 tales may not always be filled with cheer; but with light humor and tenderness, they do illuminate the human spirit.
Jonathan Fullmer, Booklist
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