The Gift by Pete Hamill

I read this for my online bookclub - Bookworms Reading Group - which is a Yahoo group. It is the story of a young sailor who is home on leave during Christmas of 1952. His family is poor, his girlfriend has left him, and he's back in the dreary apartment his large family lives in. While it was a fairly well written story, it seemed a bit simplistic and even sappy to me. I rate it 2 out of 5.