Festive Fiction - a Joint Blog

Novel-Point-Of-Viewers have had a great time thinking up their recommendations for your festive reads. Enjoy!

Victoria Cornwall writes

I have a confession to make. I have only read one book which features Christmas in it and it was so long ago I can't recall the title. I do remember enjoying it as it got me into the festive mood, so it is strange I have not read one since. So when I was asked for my recommendations I decided to cheat.

My publisher, Choc Lit, has released an amazing array of Christmas books this year so it seemed appropriate to bring them to the attention of the Novel Points of View readers. They are:

A Little Christmas Magic by Kirsty Ferry

House of Christmas Secrets by Lynda Stacey

What Happens at Christmas by Evonne Wareham

 A Little Christmas Faith by Kathryn Freeman

A Second Christmas Wish by Kathryn Freeman

Christmas at the Little Village School by Jane Lovering

I am sure there is something to meet your needs, as these books range from time-slip, through to suspense and heartwarming tales. All have a large dollop of romance and festive fun to get you in the mood for Christmas, which are the perfect ingredients for a festive read.

Rae Cowie’s thoughts

I’ve two suggestions (one full of the Christmas spirit, the other more for readers who feel a bit bah-humbug about anything too tinsely!).

Christmas at the Cupcake Café by Jenny Colgan

It’s that time of year when only some festive, feel good fiction will do and Christmas at the Cupcake Café by Jenny Colgan includes all the delicious ingredients needed for a warm and delightful Christmas romance.  We have Issy, the hardworking owner of the tinsel bedecked Cupcake Café in London. Then there’s Austin, the caring boyfriend, doing his best to get on in the world by accepting a job in snowy, lonely New York. Not forgetting Pearl, Caroline and Helena determined to make this Christmas one Issy will never forget.

Christmas at the Cupcake Café is a sequel to Colgan’s Meet Me at the Cupcake Café, however I read this as a standalone and had no problem in working out relationships between characters. This novel delivers exactly what you’d expect – and more. At the beginning of each chapter the reader is given the added bonus of a wonderful cupcake/traybake recipe. And Christmas and baking go hand in hand, right? I can’t wait to try making the Christmas Cherry Chocolate Biscuit Slice, which includes Maltesers and rum! Enjoy!

Under a Pole Star by Stef Penney

I’ll probably go straight on to Santa’s naughty list for recommending a second festive read, but I wanted to recommend one for those who aren’t so keen on all the bells and whistles that perhaps go with more traditional festive novels. Set during Arctic winters when it’s relentlessly cold and dark, at 600+ pages long, Under a Pole Star by Stef Penney is definitely one to read whilst snuggled under a cosy blanket, sipping hot chocolate (or something stronger)…

It’s a time slip novel, beginning in 1948 when we meet an elderly Flora Mackie, known by the press as the Snow Queen, returning to the Arctic, reminiscing about her time spent with fellow explorer Jakob de Beyn, offering us a hint of the mystery that unfolded years before.

We then cut to Dundee, where twelve year old Flora’s mother is dead and her father, a skipper of a commercial whaling vessel, decides to take his only child with him on his next Arctic hunt. It was fascinating to learn how the young, spirited Flora discovered how best to get along with the all male crew, how she coped with the tough realities of Arctic life, made friends with the indigenous Inuit children and fell in love with the landscape. It’s essentially a love story between two Victorian Arctic adventurers – no tinsel in sight!

Jennie Bohnet proposes something different

Trying to decide which book to recommend this year for a Christmas read was difficult to say the least - the market is flooded with Christmas titles. My choice in the end is not a Christmas book at all, nor a new one, but it is one of my favourite reads this year. It does have a religious setting which qualifies it in my mind to be included here for Christmas.

The Cleaner of Chartres by Salley Vickers

The history of the cathedral is woven around the story of Agnes Morel, the mysterious cleaning woman whose own history is unknown to the townsfolk. A traumatic story in parts, it’s also a story of how love and mercy can change things. I have to admit to knowing nothing about the ancient cathedral of Chartres before reading this book, now I long to visit and see for myself the mismatched spires and its strange labyrinth.

I think I might just curl up by the fire on Boxing Day and re-read it. Happy Christmas!

Christmas books from Linda Mitchelmore

I am always full of good intentions at Christmas to have a bit of ‘me’ time to sit in a chair by the fire and read a book from cover to cover in there amidst the mince pies and the turkey and the holly. But in truth I don’t really want it, not at Christmas. To me Christmas is all about family and I count my blessings that I have one. Books do feature in my Christmas life, though. Well, two of them do.

The first is Delia Smith’s Christmas for which I think she should have been made a Dame! There’s not a lot in there I haven’t made from it since 1994 when I was given the book for, well, Christmas as it happens. But if I had to choose just one thing to make it would be Delia’s Little Mincemeat Souffle Puddings which are just too divine for words.

Another book that I now know off by heart is Santa, a board book from Marks & Spencer which I bought for my grandson when he was two. He is ten years old now and pretends it is too babyish for him but when I read it to his younger sister he always comes to perch on the arm of my chair to look and listen, too – memories, and especially reading ones, are made of this.

Happy reading, everyone, whatever it is you choose to lose yourself in.



Jennifer Young's contribution

Bah! Humbug! Festive reads? Christmas crackers? What are you all on about? It's only the beginning of December. You’ll be wanting me to put on a Santa hat and sing Jingle Bells before I know it.

Okay, I’m not quite that bad. There’s a touch of snow on the ground just now, under a blue sky, so I suppose it all does look a bit Chrismassy. And actually I’d finished all my Christmas shopping, bar one or two bits, before the middle of November.

That said, I steadfastly refuse to recommend any festive reads, because my social media streams seem to have been flooded with them since the beginning of October. I’m a firm believer in the fact that you don’t have to wait until the end of the year to read a Christmas book, and nor should you be unable to read a summery book at Christmas.

Bearing that in mind I’m going to recommend two books, both by the same author, that astonished me this year. They’re both historicals but very different. One, The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is set in the late seventeenth century on the high seas, with a crew and their stowaways careering towards almost certain death as they fight their various demons. The second, Forgotten Places, is a chilling historical set in nineteenth century Tasmania, and contains the most astonishing twist in any book I’ve read this year.

Merry Christmas!

And finally from Gill Stewart

No bah humbug from me! I love Christmas. I know other people may disagree and think it is too commercialized etc etc but I still love it. Time for family, for close friends, for staying home and eating well – and reading lots.

I have 3 recommendations for my Christmas reads – one new and not very festive, one festive and from a few years back, and one festive and old. Enjoy!

NEW – La Belle Sauvage, Volume 1 of the ‘Book of Dust’ by Philip Pullman. Although essentially a YA fantasy read, this is a gorgeous book that I would recommend to anyone. And if it doesn’t have Christmas, it does have floods and visits to the far north – and daemons. I want my own daemon.

FESTIVE – A Proper Family Christmas by Jane Gordon-Cumming. A fun and funny read, farcical at times, but with lots of heart. My only complaint is that JGC hasn’t written another novel since this came out in 2008, although it is now available on Kindle.

OLD – Jo of the Chalet School by Elinor M Brent-Dyer. I’ve probably mentioned it before but this has truly been my go-to Christmas for the last, well, almost 50 years. Although the book covers a school year, it is the wonderful, inspiring Christmas holiday spent in snowy Innsbruck in the early twentieth century that is my favourite part. Again, it is a children’s/YA book, but one I would thoroughly recommend.