Books for Christmas Part 2

In this post we go straight into the Christmas season in a big way! We start off with a fantastic story to share with your younger children that you and they will love reading, then a book for older children that became something of a Christmas tradition in our house. Next we have two romantic comedies that are irresistible, and finally the greatest Christmas book ever written. 

Frog and Toad All Year by Arnold Lobel

Frog and Toad are two amphibian best friends whose lovely adventures are always a delight to read for parents and children alike. In Frog and Toad All Year there are four stories, one for each season, and a fifth called Christmas Eve. The final story is perfect for any night of December, but reading it on Christmas Eve is a perfect prelude to bedtime on the night before Father Christmas arrives. It is a meditation on friendship as the very excitable Frog realises that Toad is late for their Christmas Eve dinner and starts to imagine all sorts of horrible things that may have happened! The whole Frog and Toad collection is quite simply a delight, but this is extra special. It is a reading book that 6 – 8 year olds may be able to read for themselves but one that they can be introduced to far earlier at bedtime.

Merry Christmas Sleepover Club by Sue Mongredien

The Sleepover Club is a series of books about five girls from Cuddington near Leicester who form the club of the title and whose adventures eventually filled over 50 books and served as the inspiration for two series on Australian Television. This book, the only Christmas themed book, is a treat for older and younger children alike. It is based around the school panto that the girls get involved in and has a couple of subplots that revolve around a parent of one of the girls dating again, and the mystery of who is stealing food from donations to the homeless. It is tightly written, entertaining, very funny and even a little sad in places as the five girls get into their usual scrapes. The set piece finale is heartwarming and satisfying as is the resolution of the subplots. It is a perfect book for the middle of December when you don’t really want to read another story about the big day itself. As an introduction to Rosie, Frankie, Kenny, Lyndz and Fliss it is pretty much perfect and the Christmas theme made it my personal favourite. The only word of warning is that if my daughters and my goddaughter are anything to go by you will be scouring the internet and charity shops to fill in the gaps in their collection until you have bought all 54! By the way, the author of this book may be better known to some of you as Lucy Diamond, writer of female centred stories like The Beach Cafe.

Christmas Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella

It was perhaps inevitable that Becky Bloomwood would have a Christmas book written about her as Christmas is the season where many of us become Shopaholics ourselves! This is one of my favourite books of the entire series with a mixture of drama and some absolutely brilliant comic situations that render this book completely unsuitable for trains! Anyone who has read any of the Shopaholic books will know what to expect as Becky’s spending habits lead her closer and closer to disaster and her family and friends are left alternately picking up the pieces and shaking their heads. My favourite idea from the book is Sprygge which really could catch on! As befits a Christmas book it is a warm hug of a story that eases you into the festive season and warms you like a glass of mulled wine.

Miracle on Regent Street by Ali Harris

This is one of my favourite festive books, one that I’ve read 4 or 5 times over the years. Evie Taylor is a lowly stockroom girl in a store called Hardy’s which has seen better days and is on the verge of a possible takeover. She loves the store as it was the venue for her parents’ whirlwind romance and yearly visits as a young child and has ambitions to be a designer. However, she seems fated to remain unnoticed in a place where hardly any of her colleagues even know her name. That all changes as the store comes under threat and Evie decides she is the only person who can do anything about it. She also has a budding romance with a successful American businessman who doesn’t know her name or what she does, but whose attention gives Evie a glimpse of who she could be. She starts to dress herself and the store in order to get noticed, but is it too late for either of them? This book is consistently funny and consistently engaging as the two plots intertwine at various points, but there are some more reflective moments that make it a wholly satisfying read. 

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

What can I say about one of the most famous and most marvellous books ever written? Well, I have said a lot about it as the writer of an article for h2g2 and I have looked at the background, both historical and literary, thanks to books like The Annotated Christmas Carol with copious notes from Michael Patrick Hearn. It is truly amazing to reflect on the impact it has had over the years since its first appearance in 1843 both culturally and in terms of the very essence of the season itself. It is quite simply one book I will not go through December without reading in one of the five versions I own. If all you know of the story has been filtered through one of its many adaptations then read the original and marvel at the humour, anger, love and passion for humanity itself and the Christmas season in particular.

So there you have it. Part 2 of my Books for Christmas and a selection for all ages. If you do take up any of my suggestions please let me know below, and if you like my blog post please let other people know. Merry Christmas to all of you.