When you think of Christmas books, I’ll bet 10 to 1 the first (and maybe even only) book that comes to mind is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Have you ever read any others?
I’m not here to bash A Christmas Carol; it’s a wonderful book. Its popularity is well-deserved, and its impact on our modern Christmas celebrations is hard to overstate. Still, sometimes we focus so much on Dickens’ famous novella that we miss out on the many, many great Christmas books that are out there we can read during the holidays.
I’ve been having a wonderful time exploring some overlooked Christmas books; I read several each year, and with all this extensive reading, I’m going to share some recommendations with you. This list includes books of letters, Christmas short stories, ghost stories, Christmas mysteries, non-fiction, children’s books, poems, novellas, and novels. There’s something on here to suit every taste.
And while this list is geared toward adults, I do share some children’s books on here, because I think adults will enjoy them immensely, too. Christmas is a time to tap into that sense of childlike wonder and magic, and sometimes it’s the books that are “written for children” that we most need during this time.
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Whenever possible, I recommend buying books at local bookshops or throughBookshop.org, because shopping there puts the profits right into the hands of indie bookstores all over the country.
You can see all these Christmas stories for sale in my Bookshop shopping list here:
Christmas Days: 12 Stories & 12 Feasts for 12 Days by Jeanette Winterson
Jeanette Winterson has put together a treasure of a collection of 12 short Christmas stories and recipes. There’s a good mixture of stories about ghosts (in true Victorian tradition), orphans, and people finding love or life after love.
This collection is full of Christmas stories to read that are rife with magic, ghosts, talking animals, and a lot of heart. Some are spooky, some sad, some sweet, so you never get sick of hitting just one note. That also makes it a refreshing break from all of the very predictable Christmas books and movies.
Between each story is a Christmas recipe from the author with a short piece about what that recipe means and represents to her or her loved ones. And if you thought reading recipes can’t be fun, you’re in for a treat. These are like no recipe you’ve ever read: they’re sprinkled with witticisms and wry commentary, like the following excerpt when the recipe calls for unpasteurized cheese:
“Yes, all unpasteurised. I could write a long essay here about bacteria, but it’s Christmas, and bacteria aren’t that festive. I don’t blame them; it’s just not their way.”
Check out this beautiful, heartfelt, funny Christmas book. I really think you’ll enjoy it. My personal favorite stories are “Christmas-tide,” “Spirit of Christmas,” and “The Glow-Heart.”
I can’t believe that I’d never heard of this Christmas book until this year! Still, it’s worked out alright, because just this year, HMH Books published a beautiful centenary edition of JRR Tolkien’s Letters from Father Christmas filled with — well, I’ll get to that in a moment.
In 1920, when the Hobbit author’s kids wrote to Father Christmas, Father Christmas started writing back. Letters from Father Christmas is a compilation of all of Father Christmas’s letters to Tolkien’s children until 1943.
The letters in this Christmas book are just as fun and imaginative as you’d expect from a fantasy writer. There are interjections from the clumsy but sassy North Polar Bear, who helps Father Christmas with his Christmas preparations. There are tales of wars with goblins (explaining why, during wartime years, supplies are low and Father Christmas can’t send as many presents).
The centenary edition of Letters from Father Christmas includes high quality reproductions of the letters in Tolkien’s original hand
Letters from Father Christmas is just one of the most deliciously charming Christmas stories to read. One of the most surprisingly touching elements for me was seeing Tolkien’s children grow up from one year to the next through the eyes of a loving parent (I mean Santa Claus). You see children born, children who are grown and moved away but to whom Father Christmas sends love, children who’ve stopped writing to Santa.
At the end of this Christmas book, I cried when I read the very last letter, the last year that his youngest child wrote to Santa before she got too big. It reminds one of how fleeting those magical childhood years are, and how they should be cherished both during them and as a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, or godparent of a child.
This centenary edition of Letters from Father Christmas is extra special because it includes reproductions of the original letters written in Tolkien’s own Father Christmas hand (always wobbly because of how cold it is at the North Pole) as well as the original drawings. If you have a hard time reading the wobbly writing, never fear; they’ve typed up the letters as well for easier reading.
I can’t recommend this enough as a Christmas book for adults or for children, or even better, for adults and children to enjoy together (just beware of the introduction for those kids who still believe). It also makes a great Christmas gift for families and Tolkien fans.
Stories for Christmas and the Festive Season : British Library Women Writers
This short story collection is one of the British Library’s series of Women Writers. It includes Christmas-related stories from a variety of female writers from the UK, spanning from the famous to the nearly forgotten.
I love the variety in this collection of Christmas stories. The stories cover massive territory in terms of theme, time period, and genre. There’s a little bit of cozy, a bit of mystery, a bit of the supernatural, and everything in between. I definitely recommend it as one of the best Christmas books for adults to read this year.
You’ll see some names you’ll recognize, like Stella Gibbons (author of Cold Country Farm, one of my favorite cozy novels) and Muriel Spark (author of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, one of my recommended novels set in Scotland). There’s even one by Elizabeth von Arnim, author of one of my recommended books set in Italy. But the unknown writers’ stories are equally as enjoyable as the more well-known.
I picked up this collection of Christmas stories written by female writers while hunting through the many gorgeous bookshops of Manchester, UK. I love a good short story collection at Christmas. During a busy time of year, it’s nice to have little bite-sized stories to digest along with your Christmas pudding.
Since we’ve included a book with letters FROM Santa, it only makes sense to share a book of letters TO Jolly Old Saint Nick on our list of Christmas stories to read this year.
Letters to Santa is a collection of cute letters American children wrote to Santa between 1900-1920 compiled from those published in newspapers during that time.
It’s a fun, quick read that reminds one of what it was like to be a child, hoping to find the perfect gift under the tree. Nothing touches the heart like reading the most desperate desires of young children who believe in Santa Claus.
After reading through this Christmas book, here are a few of my impressions:
I never fail to be touched by the sweetness of those children telling Santa they don’t want much this year but please don’t forget their siblings; or aunts or uncles; or the poor.
Serious respect for those sassy writers who let Santa know he is to bring everything on the list, and also don’t bother with the chimney when the front door is unlocked.
Also…. were kids really being given fireworks as presents a hundred years ago? There are SO MANY requests for fireworks and even specifically Roman candles from 5-10-year-olds it made me wonder if these kids were just dreaming of the unattainable or if Santa had really questionable safety standards for children a hundred years ago!
You can find the paperback or Kindle version of this Christmas book on Amazon.
Related: Looking for ideas to add to your Christmas wish list? Check out my recommendations for unique gifts for book lovers for ideas.
A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote
This Christmas book took me by surprise. When I think of Truman Capote, I think of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and In Cold Blood, neither of which has ever been accused of being very sentimental (unless of course, you’re thinking of the movie adaptation starring Audrey Hepburn, which is a lovely film but very unlike the book).
A Christmas Memory made me ugly cry. It’s not that it’s overly sentimental or terribly tragic; it plays on the heart chords ever so gently but creates a beautiful melody. It’s an autobiographical story of Capote at the age of 7 in the 1930s.
He is a child living with all adults, his extended family members who won’t give him the time of day. The one exception is his elderly distant cousin and best friend, Sook.
Times are tough, and they are living in poverty, but the story is filled with joy. Every year, Capote and Sook look forward to putting their whole savings together to buy the ingredients for fruitcakes, which they share with everyone they think deserves them (including one mailed to the President of the United States).
This is one of the absolute best Christmas books to read this year. It is unfailingly tender and will inspire you to slow down a bit this Christmas, do less, and savor the sweet, simple moments with those who really matter to you.
A Boy Called Christmas by Matt Haig is technically a middle grade novel, but it can be enjoyed by readers of all ages. It’s an imaginative origin story of Santa Claus, Father Christmas, or Saint Nick, however you call him.
In this cute novel, Nikolas is an 11-year-old boy who goes in search of his missing father in Lapland. His father has taken on a job to prove that elves are real, and the promise of pay is too much for the poor father to ignore. But when his father doesn’t return Nikolas sets off to find him himself.
Along the way, the pieces of the St. Nick legend come together in a unique way, and Nikolas’s friends become important parts of his story. He encounters a grumpy reindeer, elves who really don’t want to be found, and others you’ll have to discover for yourself.
A Boy Called Christmas is a nice read for adults to tap into that childlike wonder of Christmas. It has been turned into a Netflix movie, but as usual, I recommend reading the book first. Haig has also written two further books in this world, making a Christmas trilogy (I haven’t read the others so can’t attest to them either way).
How’s this for fun? The most famous Christmas ballet, and perhaps the most popular ballet of all time — is based on a book!
If you’re familiar with the ballet and only the ballet, then allow me to assure you, you are not familiar with the book. This is definitely a case of LOTS of creative license being taken with the source material, so if you want to tackle this as one of your Christmas stories to read, do yourself a favor, and forget everything you think you know about The Nutcracker.
This Christmas story by ETA Hoffman is much more like Alice in Wonderland than people may realize. The main character is actually named Marie, not Clara, for starter’s. While her family believes she suffers from vivid dreams and imaginings, the incredible Christmas visions Marie sees turn out to be perfectly true: a nutcracker come to life, a battle with a seven-headed mouse, and a trip to the Christmas Wood.
If you put your expectations aside and lean into the strangeness of the tale, this can end up being one of the most fun books about Christmas you read this year. And while it’s unusual, it’s one the whole family can enjoy together.
The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories
Contrary to what you may believe, Charles Dickens wasn’t the one who first brought ghosts into Christmas stories. The tradition dates back long before him, but it was a very popular type of Christmas story in Victorian times (perhaps as a way to pass the long, dark evenings before they had electricity).
The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories compiles 13 of the best and most quintessential of these Christmas stories for you to enjoy this holiday season. They cover a great range in terms of the spookiness of the stories — after all, these are not ghost stories to read for Halloween.
While many of the stories are written by less famous and forgotten authors, there are a few stories by writers you might recognize, like Elizabeth Gaskell and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. If you want to enjoy some darker stories to balance out the sentimental this Christmas, you might want to put this short Christmas stories collection on your list.
They have continued this theme, and there are now multiple volumes to this collection for you to discover.
Newly released in English translation in 2024, Brightly Shining is a book originally written in Norwegian and that tells a quiet, simple story of sisters at Christmas.
While it is heartwarming, it is not at all fluffy. When their father has another relapse into alcoholism, Ronja and Melissa are left to fend for themselves, taking over his newly gotten job selling Christmas trees. In this beautifully written novel, they find comfort, love, and hope in each other and in other kind souls they encounter.
I picked up a signed first edition of this book at Toppings & Co. this year, and I’m so glad I did. I recommend it as a good Christmas book for adults who aren’t necessarily looking for the coziest read, but something that will really move them on many levels. It’s also a great choice for a book set in Norway if you are working on reading your way around the world.
The Secret History of Christmas by Bill Bryson (audiobook)
Bill Bryson is pretty much guaranteed to make me laugh out loud, so when I saw The Secret History of Christmas available as part of my Audible membership, I knew I had to listen to it this Christmas season. It really did not disappoint.
Bill Bryson is an American who lived in England for two decades. As such, he possesses some unique personal insight into Christmas traditions in the US vs. America, which are some of the highlights of this nonfiction book about Christmas.
This audiobook is divided into several chapters, each which tackles the history of various parts of Christmas, from how we got Santa Claus, to Christmas trees, to traditional Christmas foods.
If it sounds dry, you must not know Bill Bryson, because it’s anything but. It’s vastly entertaining the whole way through.
The Secret History of Christmas is only available in audiobook format, and only through Audible, so only Audible members can listen. But if you are an Audible member or are thinking about signing up for a free trial, put this at the top of your list of Christmas books to read this year.
The Christmas Hirelings is a heartwarming Christmas story of a surly wealthy gentleman, Sir John, who is persuaded to bring some local, poor children into his home for Christmas. Rather predictably, the innocence and exuberance of the children melts his icy exterior and teaches him a lesson not just about Christmas, but family, too.
This is one of the cutest Christmas stories to read in December, with strong Orphan Annie vibes. It’s sentimental, but in all the ways you hope a Christmas story will be.
The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree: An Appalachian Story by Gloria Houston
Here’s another Christmas book about a family with meager means enjoying the meaning of Christmas in its truest essence. The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree tells the story of Ruthie and her parents who live humbly in a little North Carolina town in the Appalachian mountains.
It’s a true story that’s been passed down orally through generations until Gloria Houston wrote it down in this children’s book. “It happened this way,” she writes, “Ruthie told me so.”
Every year in this village, one family is assigned the honor and responsibility of providing a live Christmas tree for the town’s church on Christmas Eve. This year, it’s Ruthie’s family’s turn. While Papa had helped pick out the tree in the summer months, come December he is still off fighting in the war.
In the days leading up to Christmas, soldier after soldier returns home, but no Papa. The town offers to find someone else to provide a tree, but Mama insists it’s their turn, and they will provide.
What I love about this Christmas book is how powerfully it shows a mother’s love, ever so simply and quietly. As a mother myself, this was another story that touched my heart. It shows just how much a mother does to bring joy to her children, especially at Christmas. It’s a cozy, warm Christmasy book that you can read as an adult or share with children.
Incidentally, I actually used this book to segue into the “Santa talk” with my son. It wasn’t planned, but it provided the right opportunity for us.
Related: Looking for more cozy reads? Check out my list of my top recommendations.
A Merry Christmas & Other Christmas Stories by Louisa May Alcott
No one does Christmas sentiment like Louisa May Alcott. In this book of short stories that all take place at Christmas, she captures exactly what she believes Christmas should be all about — good, Christian charity.
The stories are all rife with sentimentality and moralizing, but sometimes that’s what you want out of a Christmas read. The last story in the collection in particular is very charming. This might be a good pick as a Christmas read if you want to be inspired to do more good with your time this season.
“The Fir Tree” is a sweet little story by the master of fairytales and folk stories, Danish author Hans Christian Andersen. It’s about a little fir tree all alone in the woods, wishing it could only grow up and be put to good use. The tree ignores the advice of the birds, who’ve seen more of the world and advises the tree to be content and enjoy being young and living in the forest.
One day, the fir tree’s dream comes true, and he’s chopped down to serve as the Christmas Eve tree in a grand house for what becomes the best night of his life.
This is a Christmas book that feels like it’s meant to have a moral, though what the intended moral is is up for debate, as far as I’m concerned. As for me, it reinforced my belief in keeping a Christmas tree up as long as possible before taking it down! None of this one-night business.
Winter Solstice was one of the surprisingly memorable books I read when I was reading my way across Scotland. Though the inciting events of the story are heartbreakingly tragic, the story itself is heartwarming in all the ways you want for a Christmas read.
It’s a story of found family, of people who all desperately need genuine human connection and who find it in each other. There’s characters across a range of ages who all find themselves in a small, Scottish town for Christmas. They’ve all gone there to escape Christmas, really, but they end up celebrating it in a memorable and meaningful way, with new friends. It’s a simple Christmas, but a healing one.
In this cozy novel, strangers become friends, and friends become family, and together they all find some healing and joy at Christmas time in their quiet Scottish village.
If you haven’t got the time or the focus to sit down and read a whole Christmas book this month, turn to Maya Angelou. She wrote the poem “Amazing Peace” for the 2005 White House tree lighting ceremony, and it’s a beautiful reminder of what we all are looking for at Christmas: peace.
“Amazing Peace” does not ignore the difficulty of life nor the hate and misunderstanding that pervades the world, but it also celebrates the Peace of Christmastime shared by those of all faiths. It’s both a celebration and a call for each of us to summon that peace within ourselves to make the whole world a more peaceful place.
Here’s a small excerpt, but it’s best enjoyed in its entirety:
At this Holy Instant, we celebrate the Birth of Jesus Christ
Into the great religions of the world.
We jubilate the precious advent of trust.
We shout with glorious tongues at the coming of hope.
All the earth’s tribes loosen their voices
To celebrate the promise of Peace.
You can read the poem in its entirety for free here. Better yet, watch Maya Angelou’s reading of it at the tree lighting ceremony. Nothing compares to the deep richness of her voice reading her own beautiful, lyrical words.
The Greatest Gift is a short story that inspired the movie It’s A Wonderful Life, though you’ll quickly see when you read it that it’s more the concept that inspired the movie rather than the particulars of the story itself. A man is feeling hopeless and insignificant near Christmas, thinking of ending it all, when he’s given a chance to see what the world would’ve been like if he had never been born.
Equally as interesting a the story itself is the story of how it came to be adapted into one of the most famous Christmas movies of all time (and my peronal favorite — I watch it every Christmas Eve and may or may not be brought to tears each and every time). In addition to the story itself, this edition of the book also tells that story of why it was written, and how it made its way to Hollywood.
I think this is a great Christmas book for adults to read this year, and better yet, it’s a book you can read in one sitting.
You can always spend Christmas with the March family. While this Christmas novel definitely errs on the side of being overly sentimental, what better time to get a little sentimental than Christmas? It’s a classic for a reason.
English: Frontispiece illustration from part 2 of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888), illustrated by her sister May Alcott. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1869. *AC85.Aℓ194L.1869 pt.2aa, Houghton Library, Harvard University, Public Domain Image
In Little Women, follow along with the March daughters as they navigate life and love, growing from girls into women, with each year’s passing marked by their family’s Christmas celebration.
And while Little Women is my least favorite of the recommendations on this list (don’t hunt me down, please), it’s still a Christmas classic and worth at least one read — more, if you grew up reading it and it holds that special fuzzy place in your heart that books we loved as children tend to do.
Tip: If you haven’t seen it yet, do yourself a favor and watch the latest movie of the book adapted by Greta Gerwig as well as the 1994 version.
Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas by Stephanie Barron
If a cozy Christmas mystery is more to your taste, then I thought this is a really fun one . Jane and the Twelve Days of Christmas is a cozy mystery featuring Jane Austen as the unofficial sleuth. Barron has actually written an entire series of books based on that concept, though this is my first foray into them.
Yes, there’s murder, there’s intrigue, there’s even a little hint of romance, but it’s also a truly fascinating way to look at British Christmas traditions before the Victorian era, when Germanic traditions took over. This mystery takes place during the 12 nights of Christmas celebrations that were common during Austen’s time, and which were heavily influenced by pagan traditions.
I listened to this as an audiobook, which is narrated by Kate Reading, who’s generally recognized as one of the best audiobook narrators out there. Whether listening or reading yourself, I think this is a great choice for Christmas books for adults.
Last but not least, if you’ve never actually read A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, it is essentially required Christmas reading. While I love the movies that have been inspired by the story, like A Muppet Christmas Carol and Mickey’s Christmas Carol, nothing beats the original.
So if you’ve never read A Christmas Carol, do yourself a favor and make it a priority this year. It’s delightful, short, and inspirational. I reread it every year, either by myself, or by trying out the many audiobook versions of A Christmas Carol.
Related: Did you know that the world’s largest Dickens Christmas festival is not in the UK but in Deventer, Netherlands? R ead all about my experience visiting and what I wish I’d known before going.
Those are my choices for the best Christmas books for adults to read this year, but I’m always hunting for more. What are some of your favorites?
Pin this post to return to my recommendations every Christmas season.
Constance Ray
I'm Constance, an avid reader and traveler. I love tracking down the best literary sights everywhere I go, from the best indie bookstores to author's homes and fictional locations you can visit in real life. I'm also passionate about all things tea and chocolate. I have a BA in English literature and an MS in Nutrition Science.
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