2014 has in many ways been a bit of a shit year, globally; and I suspect we won't really be sorry to see the back of it. Books, however, are friendly things, and I suspect a review of the year in books is fairly safe. Even more so when most of the ones I've read were rather good and I think you should read them, too.

At the beginning of the year I resolved to read more women writers in 2014, and I am currently kicking myself for not having done something like that a long time ago; because as it turns out, reading 50% women writers is no hardship at all.

In fact, I started the year on a bit of a feminist kick, and read the best named book of the lot: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente, a fairly straightforward fairytale-like story which I would recommend to anyone from 10 onwards. We need more books about plucky young girls fighting their way through a somewhat hostile Fairyland, helped along the way by a half-library Wyvern. I also got a hold of Tone Almhjell's The Twistrose Key, which to my mind fits a similar pattern (and age bracket); though where Valente's allusions came wrapped in puns and language play, I found myself tracing Almhjell's influences where I do not think they were intended to shine through, and the language left a bit to ...

Gingerbread geekery is now firmly established as a Christmas tradition (three iterations and all that Christmas jazz), but after last year's star destroying success, we (Silje, Tor & I, with the occasional encouraging noises from Karoline & Anja) thought we'd change the direction ever so slightly this year. We hereby include Doctor Who in the box labelled "Christmas worthy".Being well versed in gingerbread making, we have learnt the value of a good blueprint. And the internet being what it is, we found one for both the TARDIS and Daleks. Tor also appropriated the measuring device from my mother's knitting kit, and a triangular one from my sister's long abandoned maths stash; and so we set to work.

Still a bit bruised by the utter gingerbread dough disaster that was 2012, we bought the dough ready made this year as well, but that does not mean there was no work involved. While Tor may have been the brains of the operation, I want it noted that I was the muscle.

Stop laughing.
We have yet to learn that gingerbread is an agent of chaos, however; measuring is still very much something we do both before and after baking. The universe refuses to conform to our orderly impulses, probably due to the anarchic influence of the Doctor.

The TARDIS was surprisingly simple to make (we assume the "bigger on the inside" happens once decorations are complete), the only caveat being that you must divide the doors before ...

What better book to end this series of Christmas stories than the collected letters of Father Christmas? They were written between 1920 and 1943 to the children of J. R. R. Tolkien.The very first letter was written to Tolkien's oldest child, John, when he was just three years old. It was a short note accompanying a drawing of Father Christmas and his house, as the boy had asked what it looked like where Father Christmas lived. As time progressed, however, the letters grew longer and the stories more involved, detailing life at the North Pole.

Father Christmas' handwriting is terribly shaky, both because of the snow and because "I am nineteen hundred and twenty four -- no! seven! years old on Christmas Day" and therefore cannot keep the pen steady. (I rather like the adjustment of years back from the convention to the speculated earlier date of birth for Jesus, this in a letter to a six-year-old child and his younger brother.)

The 1925 letter introduces the North Polar Bear, whose antics will keep introducing drama in the letters throughout. This year, he has climbed up the North Pole (which is an actual pole) in order to fetch Santa's hat, and in the process breaking the Pole and Santa's house (which he ...

Parody, to me, is at its best when it mashes two apparently incompatible cultural references together, and then builds on them in order to tease new fun out of old stories. It is not the parody which simply mocks, but the ludic, creative (in all senses) kind. Today's poem (because yes, it is a poem, not just a film) is one such. It takes Halloween and Christmas (season of horror and season of cheer) and uses the idea to give a new slant to famous Christmas stories. The problem with talking about parody is that you must at the same time talk about the texts parodied -- but at this point in this Christmas project, I think I have covered most of them. You are Ready.
I am sure you have all seen the film, and it is a lovely film; but before there was a film there was a poem by Tim Burton, and it is that which concerns us here. There is no Oogie Boogie or Sally, but the basic plot is recognisable. It begins with Jack's ennui:

It was late one fall in Halloweenland,
and the air had quite a chill.
Against the moon a skeleton sat,
alone upon a hill.
He was tall and thin with a bat bow tie;
Jack Skellington was his name.
He was tired and bored in Halloweenland.
"I'm sick of the scaring, the terror ...

Last night was the year's longest night, which means it is probably fitting to bring in Cold Comfort Farm. If you have no idea what I am talking about, you should go remedy that; Stella Gibbons is well worth your time: It is a glorious parody of the dour rural melodarama of the D. H. Lawrence/Mary Webb school, sometimes disparagingly called "loam and lovechild" (especially, perhaps, Mary Webb's The Golden Arrow, which Gibbons was allegedly writing plot summaries of when she had enough). If you are somehow allergic to books (or have already read it), there is a rather good adaptation with Joanna Lumley, Eileen Atkins, Kate Beckinsale, Ian McKellen, Stephen Fry and Rufus Sewell (though it leaves out one of the things I find most interesting about the book: the incidental science fiction).

Today's story is the prequel to this glorious piece of fiction. I would recommend reading the original novel, and some of the humour of the Christmas story may be lost if you do not. To offset that, allow me to tell you a little about it. Cold Comfort Farm tells the story of Flora Poste, a sensible young woman from London who has lost both her parents and as a result decides to go live with her relations in Sussex, the Starkadders at Cold Comfort Farm. Following tradition, she should discover the glory of traditional values while there; but ...

There have been some poems in this series of Christmas stories, but they have all been very Santa-oriented. When a colleague suggested I include T. S. Eliot's poem, "Journey of the Magi", I thought it might be a nice change. Also, we've had Luke; it's time Matthew got some attention, too. This is, you might say, a different take on the Christian birth story.

The poem was written in 1927, so it is an interwar poem (with all that might imply). You should also know that Eliot was a strong believer in the Literary Tradition (and himself as an important part of that literary tradition). His poems are therefore often very erudite, full of quotations and allusions. This one is not so bad, but it helps to know your Bible.

The three wise men (the actual number never actually specified, but we tend to have them portrayed as three because they brought three gifts) are going to Bethlehem to greet the new born child (although the poem never states outright the purpose of the journey -- it leaves you to figure it out for yourself, based on whatever references you can pick up on).

The original account is found in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 2. Within the context of the Christian tradition, one would expect the experience of the Magi to be recounted as a transcendent, wonderful and pure experience of joy and awe. Matthew 2:10 says that “When they saw the star, they rejoiced with ...

When we were still bright-eyed, bushy-tailed high schoolers, Tor and some friends made a list of things you could learn from history. I seem to recall "Don't invade Russia" was top of the list, but "don't drive in an open top car if you have enemies" was one of them. I have since been thinking that this particular entry should be amended to "Don't drive in an open top car or invite Poirot to spend time with you if you have enemies". Of course, that does not protect you from other people inviting him and you at the same time or neighbours inviting him to stay, in which case (I am sorry to say), the end is inevitable. Probably best not to get enemies.

I have previously pointed out that while in Norway crime is the purview of Easter, English-speakers seem to be all in favour of a murderous (when not ghostly) Christmas. And there is one author it would be a crime to neglect. Agatha Christie wrote 66 detective novels and 14 collections of short stories, and it should be no surprise that there is not just one set at Christmas. I could think of two off the top of my head, and after consulting Jamie Bernthal, I was told that there is also a Miss Marple story called "A Christmas Tragedy" (I had actually read that, but not filed it under Christmas at all) as well as some religious children's stories ...

You (two dear, faithful readers, Google-bots and random passers-by) must have wondered when Dickens was going to show up here. He is, after all, pretty much the man who gave Christmas back to England, not to mention the author of one of the most Christmasy of Christmas stories.

I'm sorry, did I say "one"? As if Dickens would limit himself so: He published no less than five Christmas books over a six year period (The Chimes, The Cricket on the Hearth, The Battle of Life and The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain, in addition to the one you have heard about), and not content to stop there, he edited Christmas numbers of his journals to be read at Christmas, like Dr. Marigold's Prescriptions or Somebody's Luggage, Mugby Junction, The Haunted House etc, etc; Dickens was Mr. Christmas. Even his final, unfinished novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood (the murder mystery without an ending) has the crucial event centre on Christmas. But while most of these stories or collections have been largely forgotten, there is one that remains.A Christmas Carol is the ultimate Christmas story: A frozen soul turned to life and warmth (I am not joking about that theme running though these Christmas stories). And quite apart from the introduction of Tiny Tim, Bob Cratchit, and Scrooge (which, like Grinch, remains a term for the non-Christmas-compatible -- presumably with a hope that they may be redeemed), it is credited ...

There is a tendency to think of Russian and Eastern European writers as ... well, a little depressing. This is not altogether true. Granted, Dostoevsky can take a grim turn (though nothing is as depressing as his happy endings, trust me), and Tolstoy's Anna Karenina does end in death and despair. But Russia is also the country of Bulgakov. And Nikolai Gogol, who precedes either, has a bit of both. He is also one of the great short story writers (thus putting paid to the idea of Russian literature as solely consisting of endless novels, in case you were labouring under that delusion).

Gogol was Ukrainian, though he wrote in Russian, and so I assume both sides in the current conflict lay claim to him). He moved to St. Petersburg at the age of 19, and only a few years later started publishing stories "from Dikanka" (a Cossack village in Ukraine). "The Night Before Christmas" (sometimes called "Christmas Eve") was one of them (originally published in 1832).

It opens quite conventionally. Or at least without any major surprises.

The day of Christmas Eve ended, and the night began, cold and clear.

Then, suddenly, a witch flies out of a chimney, collects a sleeve full of stars, and is soon joined by a devil

who had one night left to roam among Christian folk and teach them devilish tricks. Tomorrow at the first ...

I think I was eight the first time I read the Narnia books. The Christian allegory went right over my head. I did wonder why Aslan was a lamb at the end of The Voyage of the Dawn Threader (it seemed rather silly), but other than that, I was a happy reader. Quite a few things went over my head at the time, but I was used to that; in fact, I still am. I don't expect it will change.

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is not the first book in the internal chronology of the Narnia series (and I must admit that when I found The Magician's Nephew, I felt a little like I imagine archaeologists do when they find a text only hinted at in later ones), but it was in fact the first one published (and, as far as I know, the first one filmed -- has anyone actually tried to film The Magician's Nephew -- or The Horse and his Boy for that matter?). It is probably also the one with the clearest Christian allusions (with the possible exception of The Last Battle, where Lewis pretty much gives up on allusions and goes straight for explicit declarations).

Narnia was always going to feature in this series on Christmas books (and not just because it has the best title of them all). More specifically, this particular book in the Narnia series had to be here. Because Christmas permeates the first half of the story ...