Each Christmas, bookstores have displayed stacks and stacks of new Christmas books. Since this is so, why then should we come out with an eighth Christmas in My Heart? Good question! After all, are these books different from most of the others?

Dr. Wheeler has been asked that question by media interviews over and over, and this has been his standard response:

"I feel strongly that life is too short for me to waste my time reading stories that don’t take me somewhere, don’t do anything for me, don’t make me a kinder, more loving, more empathetic person. Most Christmas stories are Santa Clausy and seem rather sterile to me. In order to make it into one of my Christmas collections, a story must be Christ-centered in terms of values, and it must speak to my heart, move me deeply, force me to reach for my Kleenex box. It is this heart-tugging quotient, I submit, that has kept this series alive for eight years now."

Stories in this book include: The Beloved House, Christmas in the Heart, A Pint of Judgment, Special Delivery, plus 10 more.

Few things are harder to do than to follow up a successful book with another successful book. I remembered how impressed I was by certain performing artists I worked with during the 10 years I directed a concert-stage Lyceum series. When I would ask them which of their many concerts they considered to be their best ever, invariably the artist would turn to me and say, ‘This one, tonight’s, is going to be my greatest concert!’ I have never forgotten that lesson.

So it is that when I reread the manuscript for Christmas in My Heart, book 8, comparing the stories all the while with those in previous collections, at the end I leaned back and sighed happily: ‘It’s as fine a collection as we’ve ever done!’ I hope you agree.–Joe L. Wheeler

Joe Wheeler’s writing career started in the fall of 1992 with a collection of heart-tugging stories called Christmas in My Heart, a series that he has become well-known for. Joe Wheeler has been called everything from "Keeper of the Story" to "Father Christmas."  He has been a frequent guest on Dr. James Dobson’s radio show "Focus on the Family", and today is considered to be one of America’s leading story anthologizers, editing collections for nine publishers: Doubleday/Random House, WaterBrook/Random House, Guideposts, Focus on the Family, Tyndale House, Harvest House, Review and Herald Publishing Association, RiverOak Publishing, and Pacific Press Publishing Association.

When asked how he got started, Wheeler tells interviewers that it all dates back to being home-schooled by a remarkable woman, Barbara Leininger Wheeler, his mother (both a teacher and a missionary) in Latin America.  His mother, an elocutionist of the old school, memorized thousands of pages of stories, readings, and poetry, and frequently recited in public.  But her specialty was the old-time, sentimental, Judeo-Christian short stories.  And his mother poured herself – and her stories – into her son, inoculating him with a terminal case of the ‘storyitis virus.’ 

Wheeler has a bachelor’s degree in both history and English from Pacific Union College, a master’s degree in history, a master’s degree in English from California State University, and a Ph.D. in English from Vanderbilt University.  Today, Wheeler is senior fellow for cultural studies at the Center for the New West in Denver, Colorado, and professor emeritus of Columbia Union College in Takoma Park, Maryland.

Wheeler and his wife, Connie, make their home in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado where they receive 200 inches of snow a year.