The Mistletoe Countess by Pepper Basham is glorious. It’s one of the most entertaining books I’ve read in a very long time. A whimsical, character-driven novel, it reminds us of how God never runs out of grace. At first it appears to be a marriage of convenience story, but turns into an epic adventure as the hero and heroine try to solve a dastardly crime. I was engaged from the start and had a hard time putting it down.

The Mistletoe Countess also is a story of faith. How we can lose sight of the goodness of God when life weighs us down. Thankfully, He places just the right people in our lives to help us remember we are not alone in our struggles. God sees it all and He’s always with us even if we think He’s not. Gracelynn was the personification of God’s grace for Frederick, and their love story and Frederick’s redemption are beautiful.

There are so many wonderful quotes in this book that I’d be guilty of plagiarizing if I shared them all. Okay, maybe not plagiarizing since I’m not claiming them as my own, but I’m sure there’s something about fair use I’d violate. So, I’m going to narrow it down to illustrate the truths I found in this lovely book.

Truth One from The Mistletoe Countess

Grace, the heroine, is an avid reader. And, one of the delights of this book is how she handles life’s unexpected twists and turns by drawing on the adventures she’s read about in her favorite books. Frederick struggles with the sins of his past and a belief he has never measured up and will never do so. He needs to believe grace is available for him. Fortunately, he marries a woman who sees grace in abundance.

Grace says, “God has given you a life, and you’re the only one who can decide how to write it…Daring adventure? Grand romance? Your choices all factor into the novel of your life. So do you plan to be a hero, Lord Astley?…I have no doubt you are capable.”

This quote reminds me that while I can’t always control my circumstances, I do control how I handle them. I have a choice to believe God is in everything that happens or not to believe it. I have a choice to believe God is working for my good even in the worst of things, or not to believe it. And, while things may never go as I would wish for them to go, I still can be a heroine in my story. I can believe God is good all the time.

Truth Two from The Mistletoe Countess

Inability to move past our regret can be our undoing. We’ve all done things we would not do again if we could go back in time. It can be so easy to let regret immobilize us, so that we never have the life God intended for us to have. Once again, Grace summed up what regret is. “Regret seemed a terrible waste of mental energy with no real outcome besides a headache.”

The past is the past. We can wallow in the mistakes we’ve made. But, if we’re living in the past, we cannot enjoy the here and now and we have no future to look forward too. God’s grace covers our mistakes. God’s grace says He will remember our sins no more. If God can forget them, then why can’t we. His grace is enough, so be like the heroine, grab it and hold on for dear life.

Truth Three from The Mistletoe Countess

Choose hope. Grace thinks this about herself, “She would choose hope instead of despair, because she refused to be anything less than a heroine in her own life.” Isn’t that a beautiful idea? We live in a victim-mentality society, and I’ll be the first to admit it’s so easy to fall into it. But God didn’t make us to live in despair. If He had, he wouldn’t have sent Jesus to give us hope for a future.

No matter what has been your life up until now, you can have hope. No matter how daunting a task lies before you, you can have hope. Jesus says, He’s overcome the world and you can trust Him. And as Grace so aptly puts it, “If God chose her for this task and knew she stepped into it with all the best intentions, wouldn’t He also provide everything she needed to fulfill it?”

God will provide. If it’s forgiveness, He gives it. If it’s grace, He extends it. If it’s courage, He stands with you. If you need a defender, He will vindicate. Have hope.

Final Thoughts

Frederick and Grace are extraordinary characters that will reel you in to root for their happily-ever-after. The Mistletoe Countess has laugh-out-loud moments – one in particular near the end when Grace channels her inner Tarzan. But most of all it touches your heart and reminds you of God’s great love for his children.

As Frederick, a most swoon-worthy, dashing hero puts it, “Remember whose you are…Facing life as Earl of Astley gave him a temporary home, but living life as a child of God gave him an identity. A truth written in his soul.” Until Grace came into his life, Frederick lived trying to measure up to what the world expected of him. And, then she showed him all he was meant to be.

I understand feeling like you don’t measure up, and the truth is we will never measure up to this world’s standards. It can make us fearful. It can fill us with despair. But we, like Grace, can choose hope. Why? Because the only thing that truly matters is what God believes about us. James 1:18 sums it all up, “He (God) chose to give birth to us by giving us His true Word (Jesus). And we, out of all creation became His prized possession.”

Don’t miss this lovely book by Pepper Basham.

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