With the holiday season drawing near, the ladies of Hope
Springs, North Carolina, are making plans for a cake
cookbook—a project that will hopefully lift the spirits of
a beloved member of their close-knit quartet. But Margaret
Peele is downhearted and uninspired now that her cancer has
returned. All she wants this Christmas is to visit her
mother's Texas hometown . . . and to see their absent
friend, pastor Charlotte Stewart, who left Hope Springs to
run a battered women's shelter.
So impulsive Beatrice Newgarden Witherspoon commandeers a
very inappropriate—but comfortable—van to transport
Margaret, Louise Fisher, and Jessie Jenkins across the
country for a Lone Star State reunion with Charlotte. And
over the course of a remarkable journey they will
rediscover the greatest Christmas gift of all: eternal
friendship.