“And maybe love is, ultimately, the best we get. It doesn’t solve everything, but in spite of it all, it’s the most significant thing we have.” (Quotation pos. 3554)

Content
Since sixteen years they meet on the first Monday of December, twelve women, close friends, and members of the cookie club. Marnie is the head cookie bitch. Every member brings thirteen batches of homemade cookies, a dozen in every package, one for every member and one for the local hospice. They eat, drink, dance and celebrate together, sharing not only their cookies and recipes, but also their story, something important that had happened during the year and inspired their choice of this year’s prepared cookie.

Theme and genre
This book is about cookies, different ingredients and lifelong experiences of falling in love, separating, family, children, disappointment, loss, sorrow, but also about new chances and hope. However, most of all it is about female friendship.

Characters
Twelve different, grown-up women and each one is special, believable and far from perfect. They care and support each other.

Plot and writing
The story takes place for just one evening in Marnie´s house. Marnie is the first-person-narrator and she and the cookie club are like a frame, which includes the twelve chapters, each one for one member, her receipt, her story and information about one special baking ingredient. Therefore, we are reading kind of twelve different short stories, not one continuous storyline, which for me was different from what I expected.

Conclusion:
A story including twelve different stories about lifelong female friendship, about personal destinies and this special yearly meeting of the cookie club. A quiet, thoughtful, but not really Christmassy book that could not completely grip and convince me. ( )