Tammy’s Reviews > The Christmas Pig > Status Update

The car was going to say something (as if there is a deeper magic) but CP shoots him a nasty look. They shake on the bargain. Oh, the miracle can only happen if Jack truly loves DP and he says that he does. Of course it is about love!

The Loser does everything he can to get things lost to trap them in his land. He befuddles the mind so that things will end up in the Land of the Lost. If DP follows the rules there, he can be found. He makes the laws and he eats those who violates the laws. He sometimes cheats. CP vows to help Jack because he would like to belong to the stepsister and she will only take him if Jack has DP. Jack agrees.

The toys and furniture tell Jack they come alive for one night on Christmas Eve (like the talking beast stories). Moreover, they can guide him to the Land of the Lost where lost items end up until someone finds them. The rusty toy car knows the most because he had been lost and found many times. The car belonged to Jack’s father when he was a boy. The Loser, a play on how DP got lost, rules the Land of the Lost.

Jack is now in Wonderland! And this time the Wardrobe TALKS (it’s the deep voice). CP puts its hooves on its hips and chews Jack out for hitting him. Now, wait! Is this like an Old Covenant versus New Covenant thing. LOL It’s like Toy Story 2<\i> where the toys plan to rescue Buzz but also Beauty and the Beast<\i>, where furniture is animated, or even The Brave Little Toaster<\i>.

Ch. 13 Jack wakes up and it’s dark. He assumes he fell asleep. He hears voices in his room but he doesn’t recognize them so he pretends to be a sleep. They argue about things he doesn’t understand about a strange place where they have been. They want to wake him up. He feels something climbing his bed so he pretends to sleep. He pinches himself and it is not a dream. He quickly turns on the light and nobody is there.

It is Christmas Eve and he feels hopeless. He does not even want to celebrate. He pretends to go to bed early because he plans to sneak out and find DP. Which is crazy, but with all the opposing doubles, I’m sensing a quest in an upside down world. We shall see.

Ch. I see lots of doubles that are opposites: DP and the Christmas Pig, his father and Brendan, the homemade angel and the new storebought one, Jack and his stepsister, the old school and the new school. The mystery has emerged: what happened to DP who is now lost. DP and his mother are his two constants in life and now DP is lost. Not only does he feel lost, he is raging like he has never raged before.

On a car trip there is a battle of wills over the temperature in the back seat. Stepsis is actually she’s carsick and needs the windows wide open. Jack is freezing. He’s so tired of her behavior that he provokes her to do the unthinkable (in his mind) and I have a feeling that like the torn-up momento (which I wonder if there is meaning to what the item is), there is no true compensation for the stepsister’s actions.

Ch. 10-11 Tension builds between the stepsister who is a social-media teen diva and Jack. His family feels sorry for her and have a hard time drawing boundaries with her. When their parents work, the two stay with the grandparents. I’m cracking up at Toby, the dog. My parents have a mischievous dog named Toby and if the collar fits.... He destroys a beloved momento in a chain reaction started by stepsister.