by MC Beaton
Constable, New York 2007 (this edition UK 2016)
Age group: mid-teen to adult
Format: 240 page paperback
I’ve seen some Agatha Raisin mysteries on TV so when I saw a christmas themed book, I grabbed it to see what the books are like – and how closely they fit the TV version!
The story
Agatha Raisin aims for a perfect Christmas whilst trying to determine who gave hemlock to Mrs Tamworthy (after the lady in question told Agatha she was scared for her life).
My review
So this is book 18 in the Agatha Raisin series, but the first one I have read. It was perfectly fine to read this one before the other 17, although I assume character development and history would be better read in order. Interestingly, M C Beatonwrote the Hamish MacBeth books as well yet I find the two TV series based on the books to be quite different to each other. Have you read both series – did you find them particularly different?
The mystery itself unrelated to Christmas, but it includes a sub-story about Agatha preparing for a Christmas party to end all parties – she hopes! And the party includes a twist that readers of the series will find interesting, I believe.
Kissing Christmas Goodbye introduces a new character, Toni, for the series. This late teen girl gives opportunities to show Agatha as generous and caring, as well as grumpy and jealous of Toni’s youth and enthusiasm.
There is a complex plot to the crime in this story, with a quite unexpected result. The book also shows Agatha’s struggles with aging and men.
It was rather interesting to have many characters call each other “Mrs…” in a relatively modern setting. It gave the story a somewhat parochial feel at times and made it feel like a 1950s story, which somehow suits the tone of it overall.
So do I recommend it? That depends – as a truly Christmas book, no, not really. A sa light read over a Christmas holiday, absolutely! It is a bit of fun and fairly easy to read (the complex plot takes a little effort to keep up with!) so worth a try although it is never going to be one of my favourite books.
A short story to build the message of an elf who watches children’s behaviour to help Santa keep his naughty and nice lists current.
My review
I love the illustrations in this book – it is colourful and cheery, and fun to read. There is not a lot of text so the book will suit very young children as well as those able to read it themselves as part of their Christmas excitement.
I also like that there is a variety of children in the story – different genders and skin colours – and that dreams of gifts are not genderised (for instance, one child wants a boat and a doll while another wants a tennis racket, a nutcracker and a doll).
It is an Australian book and shows the elf crossing Australia and New Zealand in Santa’s sleigh. So I would have preferred the use of ‘jobs’ instead of ‘chores’ and perhaps some reference to the boomers instead of just reindeer.
Unfortunately, by the end of the second read, pages were starting to come loose so the construction quality is not great and I’d be wary of letting toddlers read it alone…
* Unfortunately, the publication date is not printed on the book nor can I find it elsewhere…
In the last couple of years, the idea of Santa sending an elf to visit in December has become widely known across Australia.
And leading up to Christmas 2017, a number of friends were visited by an elf and thus my children were keen to have an elf in our home, too.
When to welcome an elf to your house?
Apart from anything else, I didn’t think it would work very well to have an elf arrive part way through December. I guess it could have been too busy helping Santa at the North Pole to get here for the first of December, but it felt strange to me.
If you have a visiting elf in your house, when did it arrive? Do you think it matters when he or she arrives?
However, it also seems a long time until next Christmas, especially for young children, so when I came across an elf the other day I thought of having him pop in now to say hello in preparation for next December.
Tinkles was acrobatic before she even left the box!
As we worked on removing the tree decorations, we discovered an elf hiding amongst the branches!
Tinkles hiding in our tree!
My children were very excited to discover we had a visiting Christmas elf! And even more so when they discovered the elf had a letter from Santa with her to introduce her as Tinkles the Elf. After a brief visit today, the letter explained, Tinkles will return on the first of December to watch over our family and report to Santa.
Tinkles lying with the letter she delivered from Santa
We finished packing up the tree and have left the elf sitting on our mantelpiece to be close to the chimney for his return to Santa at the North Pole. It also gave them a timeframe to write their thank you letters to Santa so the elf could deliver them directly for us.
Tinkles on the mantelpiece with a thank you letter for Santa
by Dugald Steer
illustrated by Susanna Ronchi
Ken Fin Books, Collingwood, October 2004
Age group: 2-8 years
Format: hardcover picture book
I saw this book at a friend’s house when she encouraged me to read it, knowing that I love Christmas and books! I’m glad she did.
The story
It’s Christmas and Jack-in-the-box is disappointed that the toys don’t get any Christmas gifts.
My review
This is a beautiful book. Not only are Ronchi’s illustrations bright and colourful, the pages are textured with the main images embossed on the page. I found it impossible not to run my fingers over every page as I read this book.
The story is nice and simple – Santa forgets to bring gifts to the toys. Most of the toys accept they are toys, lol, but Jack is upset and sets about getting the toys acknowledged.
Jack sets out to make a Santa experience for the toy box residents, including a bird-pulled-sleigh! It involves the toys all working together, especially once someone gets stuck in the chimney!
Every page has a sign of Santa to find, too. The story ends, unsurprisingly, with Santa making Christmas extra special for Jack and his toy friends.
Absolutely gorgeous book to have on display for Christmas!
So why not use that clean up as a chance to declutter and set up a new home atmosphere to start the new year?
With the end of Christmas, a clean up is in order…
Christmas tidy up tips
as you undecorate the tree and house, repair or throw out broken decorations – you don’t want to open the box next December to discover broken ornaments (and you know December is not the time to plan on repairs!) Remember to check all lights, too, and throw out any with damaged cords and replace globes now.
as you put away decorations, look at each one and only store ones you want or treasure
if you’ve been thinking or reorganising your Christmas storage (or the cupboard, attic or garage you keep them in) do it as part of putting the decorations away – leaving it until later in the year usually means it won’t happen!
if you made room for the tree, consider how to reuse that space instead of repeating how it was. Maybe it would be a good spot to put a standing lamp or hang a family photo?
new items received over Christmas can be impetus for reducing stuff. For example, if you got 3 books, try to donate at least 3 of your existing books to a friend or charity; new hats and clothes for the kids often means you can get rid of the smaller ones; donate or sell old electronics if you get an upgrade.
Christmas is followed by a new year, and a new year = a new start. An annual sort of books, toys and clothes is easier over the holidays and a good time to remove things the kids have grown out of during the last year.
look at the photos and pictures you have on display. Could some be updated or moved to anew position to generate more interest? Maybe you have some recent Christmas photos that could form a new display on the walls. Make sure to review the children’s bedrooms and spaces, too, and their artwork.
What other things do you do after Christmas to help make your home nicer?
And so we have reached the final flaps in our advent calendars – is the excitement at fever pitch in your family yet? There was speculation from my children – would it be Santa, or maybe a reindeer, some presents or Santa’s chair? But there was no doubt it would be something Christmas…
My daughter was very happy to find a Santa snowman – that is, a snowman with a red top and a Santa hat. So the Friends advent calendar had some disappointments early on but the rest was up to expectations and my daughter seems to have forgotten her sadness, which is good. It does have me wondering whether or not to bother next year, so I guess I will be looking at other options for 2018.
While I think it is just a sad anomaly, we found nothing behind the final flap of the 2017 City advent calendar 🙁 We can see it was meant to be Santa – and we searched the box and everywhere around where we have kept the calendar, but Santa was not to be found unfortunately.
While Christmas and animals are the concepts for these three days in the Friends calendar, the City calendar has moved away from vehicles …
Day 20…
Behind the 20th flap in the Lego Friends advent calendar was a Christmas tree – and as per previous years, the tree itself is different to the Lego City version.
Day 20 of the Lego City calendar, however, produced a man with chain saw – I’m not quite sure why, unless you think he was cutting down trees to be used as living Christmas trees?
Day 21…
My daughter was happy to find two presents (including a jewel inside the larger box) to put under her Friends Christmas tree.
The City calendar addition for day 21 was, ah, interesting and took a little thought to identify what is was meant to be. We have decided it is an ice sculpture of a snow angel! What do you think it is?
Day 22…
Well, there wasn’t much surprise to know that the Friends calendar had a black horse for day 22 , given we found it on day 16!
In the City calendar, however, my son found what he insists is a sleigh as “I haven’t got a sleigh for Santa yet”, rather than just a form of snow mobile/sled.
For 62 years, the Burke St Melbourne’s Myer store has put on a magical Christmas display in their windows.
Myer window history
Each year, a different theme or story connects the 6 or so windows and people queue up to see what has been done. It is estimated that about 1.2 million people see it each Christmas!
Over time, other Myer stores have also showcased animations in their windows – generally, Brisbane matches Melbourne while Wagga Wagga, Ballarat and Geelong reuse the displays from Melbourne a year or so later (which gives me a chance to visit some I may have missed!).
Now, there are security guards to create an orderly queue. Years ago, it was just a scramble of people trying to see over each other’s shoulders and wait for a turn towards the front of the crowd to see.
An absolutely perfect Christmas story
For the last couple of years, Myer’s ad campaigns for Christmas have centred around some living Christmas decorations. This year, that theme continues alongside a book about those same decoration characters – in particular, about Elf and his desire for an absolutely perfect Christmas.
The book is called The completely and utterly, absolutely perfect Christmas and written H C Floren for Myer and can come to life with an augmented reality app. At this stage, the book is only available through Myer stores (including online).
Elf and his friends Reindeer, Mouse and Angel feature in the window animations. As you move along the windows, the story follows Elf’s journey to find some suitably dedicated decorations as he doesn’t think his friends are taking decorating seriously enough.
Through a progression of stops where other decorations also are not quite right for him, Elf makes his way back home for a wonderful, slightly imperfect Christmas instead.
The absolutely perfect window scenes
We really enjoyed the windows this year, and were lucky enough to only have a short queue to wait in.
For those unable to see these beautiful windows, here are some photos from our trip to the Burke St mall. Obviously, these are taken through glass so are not the best photos, although I must say I actually like the gum tree reflection across the top of pictures!
The story starts with Elf and friends trying to decorate their Christmas tree
My daughter was very happy to find a stand for the proud cat, including a ramp and scratching post ‘just like a real scratching post thinggy’.
day 18
On day eighteen, we found what I call a lamp post, although lamp posts don’t usually have bows on them so I’m not entirely sure what it actually is meant to be! Any suggestions for me?
day 19
There were sounds of excitement as my daughter discovered another trailer for the snow mobile to pull along so Stephanie can take her menagerie with her! In lining them up, I also realised that the ‘smaller cat’ was actually a cute little mouse which makes more sense than one small and one tall, proud cat!
Lego City
day 17
Over in Lego City, we discovered a helicopter on Saturday furthering the collection of vehicles for my son.
day 18
When asked what he found yesterday, my son told me it was ‘the lady who controls the helicopter’. She is in a work suit and holds a walkie talkie – maybe she controls all the vehicles.
day 19
We must be getting closer to the 25th, as we have started getting the Christmas items with a Christmas tree! Compared to previous years, I was a little surprised it is just a plain tree without decorations.
Some definite themes are showing through the calendars now, which is not something we have noted in previous years. That is, there has been an overall theme of snow and ice plus Christmas, but not a theme within the larger scene.
To mark this halfway point, the Lego City calendar‘s fourteenth flap revealed a boat… I’m not quite sure how a boat fits into the snow theme unless it is a toy for the snowboarder!
So can you guess what was in the Friends calendar for day fifteen? Yes it was a stand and animal – a cat (or maybe a kitten?) this time – so we really are building up a collection!
The city calendar included a cute little fire truck for my son, which he was quite happy with.
Day sixteen
Today, my daughter told me she found a cat, a fish and a horse in her calendar. However, it turned out that the horse was actually from day 22 and had somehow fallen into the day 16 section. So in reality, day sixteen produced a cat and a fish – nothing to create, and a strange arrangement of the fish being larger than the proud cat, kitten, dog and bird already obtained from the calendar. The fish, in fact, is about 2/3 the height of the Lego people!
In the City calendar, my son created a race car – so obviously his theme is vehicles with a train, two planes, a boat, a fire truck and a race car to date.
Have you developed a collection within a set of an advent calendar?
