Now Reynaldo must convince one Songbird to return. Just one. Or he will use devastating magic to make sure she never sings from her heart again.

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Songbirds

By Kristine Kathryn Rusch

The rain was hard, and cold, the village a welcome sight. Reynaldo had been riding for days without seeing any signs of civilization—and he had thought that good. If he were to find the Songbirds, he believed he would find them in this wilderness at the very edge of the kingdom.

But even the best hunter welcomed a respite after days of unrelenting rain. The village was as dismal as the weather: small hovels with little more than a door, the occasional house, and finally, at the end of town, an inn that looked like it had seen better days.

At least it had a stable. He dismounted and looked for a stable hand. Seeing none, he led Cara to the only stall.

He would have tended her himself even if there had been a stable hand. She was the only pure white horse in the kingdom. He never let anyone else touch her—only his brushstroke cleaned her coat, only his hand fed her, and he cherished the small nuzzle she would give his shoulder, or her soft sighs of contentment. They were his best reward, and his only real joy.

His life was bleak—had been since he was a boy—but he knew no way of improving it. He already lived in the palace, and was the best in his field. He wasn’t sure he had the capacity for love, and if he did, he wasn’t sure if it would improve his life. The kingdom was a gloomy place, but he’d heard of none better.

He’d only seen better in his dreams—dreams he could barely remember.

The hay in the stalls was fresh. There was good food, several buckets of rainwater, and surprisingly, a handful of apples. He gave Cara one—a thank-you for carrying him so far—and then he stroked her velvet nose.

“If the stable hand shows up and gives you trouble,” he said, “call for me. You know I’ll hear you.”

She whickered and nudged him, as if urging him to go inside the inn, and take care of himself.

He hated to leave her, but he really wanted a warm meal and a soft bed. If there was no room, he’d sleep in the hay. Cara wouldn’t like it; she wanted privacy at night. But he would rest easier, knowing she was all right.

She nudged him a second time, and he smiled. “All right, I’ll go. Sleep well.”

But she wasn’t looking at him any longer. Her head was bowed, and she was drinking from one of the buckets he’d set near her. When he walked back into the rain, it seemed as if she had forgotten all about him.

***

The inn had one room left, so small that to call it a closet would be to give it dignity. He’d left it almost immediately and headed into the tavern. Locals clustered around the wooden tables, drinking the watered-down ale.

He picked a table in the back corner, close enough to the fire to get warm, but far enough away that no one would notice him. One of his best skills was his ability to disappear into his surroundings, to make those around him comfortable by his quiet.

“We have mutton tonight,” the serving wench said. She had noticed him quicker than he liked. He looked up at her with surprise. He hadn’t even heard her approach.

She was young and thin, barely big enough to carry trays.

“Mutton is fine,” he said.

She nodded, and went away. He leaned back in his chair, legs stretched out before him, ankles crossed. His dark pants, tucked into his scuffed boots, were wet and mud-covered. Only his shirt remained dry, except on the shoulders, where his long black hair dripped.

The tavern was clearly where the innkeeper made his money. Only a handful of the locals were eating, and once his food came he knew why. The mutton was old and gray, leaving a pool of grease in the broth, and the bread had mold on the corners.

Because he hadn’t eaten in two days, he picked off the mold and choked down the bread, but the mutton wasn’t worth his time. He sent it back with a request for cheese and some more bread.

It took the serving wench only a few moments to bring him a new plate. The food on this one looked appetizing. The bread was still warm. The cheese was a perfect white, soft to the touch. Obviously, the innkeeper here had two kinds of food: the cheap horrible stuff for travelers, and the good food for regulars. By complaining, Reynaldo had put himself in a new category.

He thanked the girl and sighed as she walked away. He wished she were plump and world-wise. He would have loved someone warm in his bed tonight. The road had given him a chill. He hadn’t expected to have been traveling for so long.

Prince Tadeo had his heart set on a Songbird for the coronation. He had sent Reynaldo—and no one else—after it. Reynaldo was the best magic hunter in the Kingdom, and this trip was meant as an honor—or perhaps a chance at humiliation.

He knew that the other magic hunters had snuck away surreptitiously, hoping to beat him at the profession he had invented. But they would not. In their entire careers, they only found the easy, obvious creatures. It took Reynaldo’s patience, his determination, and his stillness to bring the truly elusive creatures out of hiding.

That, and his ability to find the remote places where the creatures lived in the first place. He had been the only one of Tadeo’s hunters to capture creatures like unicorns and sea witches. His triumphs gave him a room in the palace, a favored position at Tadeo’s table, and a bit of gold, but not enough to last him through the long dry spells between Tadeo’s whims.

Songbirds were proving the most elusive of the magics that Reynaldo had ever sought. Reynaldo had hoped that Tadeo wouldn’t learn of them, but he did a year ago when a storyteller visited court. The storyteller told an ancient tale about the Songbirds and the days when their magic filled the kingdom. Then they had served the king and, more than once, saved his crown.

Things had changed in the centuries since. For reasons the storyteller did not explain, the Songbirds rebelled. Most were slaughtered, and the remainder—it was said—went into hiding. No one had seen a Songbird in nearly a thousand years.

Reynaldo had tried to tell Tadeo that, but of course the Prince didn’t listen. Tadeo had been a magic collector since childhood, and to get a magical creature thought extinct only increased the lure. Tadeo thought it perfect for his coronation, half a year away. He wanted to reveal the greatest magic of all on that day.

Reynaldo sighed and ate the thick warm bread. It had a freshness that was foreign to his tongue. Not even the bread at the palace was this good. His second mug of ale was not diluted this time, and the cheese was the best he had ever tasted.

He was nearly done eating when the serving wench climbed on a stool in front of the fireplace. Conversation ceased, and Reynaldo pushed back his chair. The girl seemed too young to be the entertainment, but she wrapped her hands around her knee as if she were accustomed to sitting in front of a crowd. She surveyed everyone before her gaze met his. She had very old eyes.

She leaned her head back, and began to sing without accompaniment. The hush in the room grew. Her voice had a richness and depth that he had never heard in a human voice before. It had overtones, undertones, and harmonics all its own.

Her first song had no words, and neither did her second. By the third, he no longer listened for words, only for tonalities and phrasing. The sound of her voice sent shivers through him. The place seemed brighter, the fire warmer, and the girl prettier.

He found himself wondering if he’d had too much to drink, and knowing he hadn’t. He was listening to a Songbird.

He had completed his quest.

***

Reynaldo knew better than to capture her in public. He had some research to do. He needed to find out if the girl’s family were all Songbirds and if the rest of the village knew it. The girl—young as she was—might not be the best choice for Tadeo’s collection. An older Songbird might serve better and not be as hard to hold.

Magic, Reynaldo knew, was always hard to hold, especially for those who had none. He had captured magic countless times using only his intelligence and his strength. Underestimating magic was always the worst thing a hunter could do.

Reynaldo listened until the girl finished her miraculous concert. The local crowd applauded and then went back to their ale as if the girl had done nothing unusual. He allowed himself to be shocked and pleased, made a point of complimenting her on the beauty of her voice, and got a blush in return as well as a free mug of ale. But he asked no questions, sought no answers, just paid his tab with one of his last coins and took the stairs to his tiny room.

And there he collapsed on the bed, determined to have a plan by morning.

***

Reynaldo dreamed of colors so bright that they hurt his eyes, scents so pure that they cleared his head, and fabrics so soft that they soothed his skin. He had had dreams like this before. He believed they were moments when he actually touched magic, when he was allowed to enter a world where life was more vivid, each sensation more profound than the one before. He knew if he stayed here long, he would never want to leave. But he also knew that he could not stay.

The colors faded first, then the scents, and finally the softness. He was cold and damp, and the bed smelled of swamp water. He stirred, realized that his face was wet, and opened his eyes.

He was lying face-down in a rut on a muddy road. It was raining so hard that the rut was filling with water. If he’d dreamed much longer, he would have drowned.

Reynaldo sat up and wiped the mud from his face. He was wearing his cloak and boots, even though he had taken them off for bed. The cloak had been stolen from a water elf, and kept his torso dry. But his pants and boots were wet as they had been the night before.

He was in a clearing, and the road continued north into a forest of trees. The same forest he had seen the night before at the edge of the village.

But the village itself was gone. There were no hovels, no small houses, no inn. And no stable.

Cara. He felt his breath catch. He scanned the area, looking for her, hoping she was grazing beneath a tree. He should have seen her white coat even if she were miles away, but he saw nothing except the dark trees, mud, and the greenish gray grass.

She was gone. They had taken her, his prize possession, his heart, and his companion.

It was almost as an afterthought that he patted his cloak, feeling for his purse—humble as it was—and couldn’t find that either.

The great magic hunter had been robbed by his quarry. They had known from the beginning who he was and what he wanted, and they had toyed with him all night. Then they had left him here, alone, to die.

Although that wasn’t accurate. He had clearly been at their mercy. They could have killed him at any point. They let him live as a warning, perhaps to Tadeo, or perhaps to himself.

But they had taken Cara, and no one did that. He had to find her. He couldn’t imagine being without her.

Rain splattered around him. The puddle grew deeper, the mud thicker. He got up and shook his hair free of his cloak, and studied the area, looking for signs of magic.

The clearing was an unnatural one, with paths that branched off the road and then stopped. Large patches of dead grass, and even larger patches of mud covered the ground. He saw bits of hay and horse manure where the stable had recently stood.

The village had been here, just as the inn had been here, just as the stable had been here. But it was all gone now.

The wind came up, cold and biting, pushing Reynaldo back toward the palace. He stood his ground.

He had eaten fairy food and had awakened hungry. He was not hungry now. He had slept the sleep of the enchanted and awakened exhausted. He was not exhausted now.

Obviously his meal and dreams had been as real as they had always been. During his sleep, the Songbirds had taken their village and left him behind.

If Reynaldo went back to the palace for help, he would have to admit his failure. His failure would please Tadeo almost as much as success. Tadeo had been giving Reynaldo tougher and tougher assignments, hoping for this day when his great magic hunter would falter.

But Tadeo did not realize that success was all Reynaldo had. No family, no real friends, no wealth, and no home of his own. Since Reynaldo had been forced into this cursed life by his even more accursed talent, he had lost everything except himself.

Now he faced losing even that.

He would not ride back to Tadeo in shame. He would retrieve his horse, at the very least. At the very best, he would clip the wings of a Songbird and carry it home to its own large, beautiful, gilded cage.

***

Six days of tracking on foot. It rained the entire time—although the rain varied from a downpour to drippy mist. The forest seemed empty of life except for Reynaldo, downed branches, and fallen leaves. He managed to scrounge berries, roots, and bark. That and rainwater kept him sated. But he never had a fire, and his feet were never dry.

The rain, he knew, was not natural. Nor was the stillness of the forest. He had to strain to hear his own feet moving through the mud.

And as he walked, he reviewed what the stories had told him about Songbirds.

Songbirds looked human but lacked all human kindness, all human warmth. Their magic lived in their songs. As long as a Songbird sang the same piece—without starting over—it could create a world with that music. Or it could persuade, cajole, or change a long-held opinion. Some even said that a Songbird’s song could make a heartless man fall in love.

On the seventh day Reynaldo found the village beside a raging river. The village looked the same as before. The houses were in the same order: the road went through the center with paths coming off the sides. The inn was at the north end, and the stable was beside it.

He knew that he found the place because they wanted him to. If they could move the village, they could have kept it hidden from him forever. They finally wanted to see him—for reasons he was sure he would soon discover.

Reynaldo went directly to the stable and pulled open the wooden doors. Lamps hung from pegs on the wall, shedding a soft light on the straw-covered floor. Cara was in the last stall. She whickered when she saw Reynaldo, and his heart leapt. He had missed her; part of him had thought he would never see her again.

He stepped inside. For the first time in a week, water did not hit him in the face. He was cold and numb, unable to absorb the heat.

He started toward Cara when a melodious voice said, “Stop.”

Reynaldo sighed. He had known that it wouldn’t be this easy.

“Give me my horse and my money,” he said, “and I will leave you in peace.”

“Of course you will.” The voice mocked him. “Until you remember your promise to your prince to clip our wings.”

The phrase was not metaphorical. Songbirds had wings, so the stories said, invisible wings that, if clipped properly, would forever trap them in the hand that maimed them.

“You seem to know a lot about me.” Reynaldo was still watching Cara. The horse was not nervous around the Songbird, and magical creatures usually made Cara skittish.

“Dreams reveal much about the dreamer.”

So they had peered into his sleep. The Songbirds had a greater magic than he had originally thought.

“But dreams do not reveal all,” Reynaldo said. “I did not promise Tadeo that I would clip your wings. I promised him a Songbird for his coronation.”

“For his collection.”

Slowly Reynaldo turned, hands out, showing that he meant no harm. “Tadeo always wants magic for his collection. What he does with the magic I bring back is his choice. I was instructed to bring back a Songbird for the coronation, nothing else.”

He could not see the Songbird, but there were shadows near the door that hadn’t been there before.

“You tell pretty lies,” the Songbird said. “Is that how you capture your prey?”

“No.”

“Pity. It would seem the logical thing.” The Songbird stepped out of the shadows. It was the girl, the one who had waited on him, who had sang to him. Only she was not a girl. That had been an illusion. She was a small woman whose hair, skin, and eyes were brown. She wore a brown cape over brown clothing. The only spots of color on her were her red lips and rosy cheeks.

She held herself like a human woman would. He had thought Songbirds would move differently to protect their invisible wings.

“My horse,” he said softly, “and my money. Then I will leave.”

She smiled. “You’re exhausted and wet. You haven’t eaten properly in a week. We can give you food and shelter.”

“Like you did the last time?” he said. “I nearly drowned.”

“The food was real enough, and the bed, too. You spent half the night in it.”

“You let me know what you were.”

“It took you long enough to figure that out.”

“I knew the moment you sat on that stool.”

“And you did nothing? That’s hard to believe.” She crossed her arms. Her cloak bunched slightly, unnaturally, in the back.

“You watched me that first time, peered into my dreams when I slept in the forest, and then let me find you.” He glanced at Cara. She seemed to be watching with great interest.

The Songbird did not answer his question, but he saw the truth of it in her eyes. That was the only way they would have known his identity. He hunted infrequently, and never the same creatures twice.

“That still doesn’t explain,” he said into her silence, “why you’re treating me this way. You could have killed me that night. Or better, you could have ignored me. There was no reason to let me see your village. But you want something. What is it?”

“We want to give you your life back,” she said.

He felt his shoulders stiffen. “My life has never left me. Or are you telling me that I’m dead?”

“You’re not dead.” Her voice was soft. “You just haven’t lived for years.”

“Perhaps by your definition.” The tension was working its way down his back. “I don’t sing pretty songs and laugh as much as some think I should. But I live.”

“In service to a boy who believes that beauty should be caged.”

Reynaldo took a deep breath. Some of the tension slipped away. “So that’s it. You want me to renounce my work.”

“More than that,” she said. “We want you to free the creatures that Tadeo holds.”

“We?” he said. “Do you speak for yourself or your people?”

“The Songbirds listen to me.”

“And they want me to destroy Prince Tadeo’s collection.”

“Yes.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because of your dreams.” She took a step toward him. Her voice was mesmerizing, warm, and rich. “I can let you live in the world of your dreams.”

He recognized charm when he heard it. Of course Songbirds could entice. Magic lived in their voices.

“Live in the world of my dreams.” He made it sound like he was tempted and—if he told himself the truth—he was. “The lush beautiful magical world that I see whenever I’m near something unusual?”

She nodded.

“You want me to risk everything, including my life, for a place where the food tastes better and the colors are brighter? A world I can barely remember when I’m awake? A world I’m not even sure exists?”

Those eyes held him. “Are you sure this one exists?”

He laughed. “I am not a philosopher. Questions like that are better contemplated by smarter men than I.”

“There are few men smarter than you are,” she said. “You simply have chosen a poor way to use your intelligence.”

He crossed his arms. “The creatures I’ve given to Prince Tadeo live in complete luxury.”

An emotion flashed across her face too quickly for him to read it—Disgust? Amusement?—he wasn’t sure.

“You must decide what you want.” The vibrancy had left her voice.

“What if I don’t do what you want?”

“Then you’ll wander the forest until you decide to return empty-handed. You will lose your status as the greatest magic hunter, but you will have your life. Or you could choose to make a new life away from the kingdom. You do not have to do what we want.”

The tension had spread through him. “If I do what you ask, Prince Tadeo will have me killed.”

“You chose to come after us.”

“There are others who are after you.”

Her eyes glittered. “But there is only one who can free Tadeo’s prisoners.”

He was silent for a moment, weighing her words. Then he said, “What if I don’t want to live in the land of my dreams? If I do what you ask, what will you give me instead?”

“A miracle,” she said quietly.

He had seen miracles all his life—and had captured them for his prince.

“I’ll do as you ask,” he said.

***

An instant later he was in the rain, on Cara’s back, heading toward the palace. A week of riding, vanished in a single moment.

It felt good to touch her. Part of him thought he had lost her forever. He touched her mane for reassurance, and she grunted, as if he had disturbed her rhythm somehow.

The rain seemed even colder, the wind harsher. The drops stung at his cheeks. Cara’s hooves threw mud on him, and only the horse’s innate grace prevented them from slipping on the washed out roads.

It had rained here too, rained like he had never seen. Tadeo would be displeased. He hated rain—always longing for sun or snow.

And now Reynaldo was returning without his prize. He had thought he would have time to come up with a story, but he had nothing. It was the same as having failed.

The palace stood alone at the edge of the Great Wood. The Royal City was several miles to the south. The palace, built a thousand years ago, was purposely isolated; the land itself was seen as a protection against rebels who would attack a king.

But for nearly ten years, there had been no king to attack. Tadeo’s father had died of a wasting disease. Tadeo’s mother, his father’s fifth wife and the only one to bear a child, had become Queen Mother, but the kingdom’s laws prevented her from ruling despite her son’s youth. Since he was eleven, Tadeo had acted as king. On his twenty-first birthday, he would become king officially.

The coronation would be his greatest triumph—or so he hoped.

Reynaldo reached the palace gates where the guards recognized him and opened the way. He headed straight for the stables. Once Cara was groomed and fed and placed in a comfortable stall, Reynaldo tended to his own needs.

His rooms were large and well furnished. The main room had carved wooden cabinets that were centuries old, couches embroidered by ladies in waiting of nearly two dozen different queens.

Reynaldo did not even look into the bedroom or the small dining room. Instead he ordered a bath, then went to the wardrobe to choose the proper clothes for an audience with Tadeo.

With the bath came food, and a summons from Tadeo.

The bath was heaven, the steaming water soothing to his cold limbs. He felt as if he hadn’t been warm in a year; he ate grapes and small cakes, and drank the cool artesian water.

When he was through, he dressed in silk robes over a white shirt, and a pair of velvet riding trousers which he tucked into polished black boots. The outfit was a mixture of court dress and his usual clothing. He was the only member of the court who did not follow Tadeo’s strict dress codes.

Reynaldo hated looking tame.

He took back corridors and a secret passage that led to Tadeo’s private audience room. Although Reynaldo was not keeping his return a secret, he did not want the news of it to spread too quickly either.

He had the beginnings of a plan.

He knocked on the hidden door, and Tadeo himself opened it. The prince was slight, dark-haired, and smooth-skinned. He hadn’t yet matured enough to grow a beard.

“I have not heard of any great triumph,” Tadeo said as he stepped aside, allowing Reynaldo into the room. “Where’s my Songbird?”

“Elusive,” Reynaldo said.

“Elusive or not, you were supposed to find one.” Tadeo crossed the hand-woven carpet to the gilt chair that he only used when speaking business. “Have you?”

“I have been following myth, legend, and rumor for weeks.” Reynaldo took a simple wooden chair and sat across from Tadeo. “I found a village at the very edge of the kingdom which led me to believe that some of what I heard is true, and some is not. What is clear is that Songbirds are more powerful than the stories let on. That the kingdom held them in thrall once seems almost miraculous to me.”

Tadeo waved a hand in dismissal. He did not care about the past, only the present. “If you were close, I don’t understand why you came back.”

“To offer you a choice.” The room was too warm—a fire burned high, probably to ward off the damp. The windows were shuttered against the rain, but Reynaldo could hear it, beating against the walls as if it were trying to break in.

Tadeo raised his eyebrows. “A choice? There is no choice, Reynaldo. You are to bring me a Songbird.”

“At any cost?”

“Yes, at any cost.” And then Tadeo frowned. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“The price,” Reynaldo said. “But if you don’t want to hear it….”

“You know that I will not pay you more than we have already agreed.” Tadeo crossed his arms. He was getting angry.

“The cost is yours, not mine.”

“Whatever does that mean?”

“It means,” Reynaldo said, “that magic is powerful, and sometimes not worth the price of capture.”

“Nonsense,” Tadeo said. “We haven’t paid a price before.”

Reynaldo stared at him for a moment. Tadeo was so young that his skin was still soft and lined with baby fat. He had no idea how life exacted a price.

“Well, then,” Reynaldo said, pushing himself out of the chair. “If you are unconcerned, I will go about my business.”

He had almost made it to the door when Tadeo said, “You’ve never approached me about a price before. What has changed this time?”

Reynaldo did not turn around. Instead, he smiled. He had maneuvered Tadeo into the place that he wanted him. “The only way I can catch a Songbird is to open the cages of your collection.”

“My collection!” Tadeo sounded stunned.

Reynaldo slowly faced him. The boy’s cheeks were red. He didn’t like the idea. He would now have to choose between all his toys and a single great prize.

“Are you certain you will be able to capture a Songbird with this method?” Tadeo asked.

“Yes,” Reynaldo said.

Tadeo leaned back in his chair. It was still too large for him. He looked like a child trying to act like an adult. All except his eyes. They were too cold to be a child’s. “Can you recapture my collection?”

“Of course, Sire. They have my marks. They should be easier to find this time.”

“How do I know that you’re not doing this just to create more work for yourself?”

Reynaldo smiled. “Because there is still so much work to do. You only possess a fraction of the magic that exists in this Kingdom. If you want a complete collection, you must hire two others who are as good as I am—and we both know there are none—and then the three of us must capture a magical creature once a month.”

Tadeo sighed. “Quite a risk you’re taking, Reynaldo. I will kill you if you fail.”

“Actually,” Reynaldo said softly, “It’s your risk, Sire. My life is not worth the price of your collection.”

“True.” Tadeo stood. He took a deep breath. He was clearly uneasy about the decision, but he had made it, as Reynaldo wanted him to. That way, if Tadeo was dissatisfied with the Songbird, he had no one to blame but himself. “You have my permission.”

Reynaldo bowed once. “Thank you, Sire,” he said, and let himself out.

***

The collection was housed in its own tower on the palace grounds. Tadeo had had the tower built special after Reynaldo had caught his first creature. The tower was designed so that the nobles could view the collection, perhaps even see a bit of magic, without harm—and without fear that the creatures would escape.

Tadeo had dismissed the guards. The rest of the staff had been ordered not to interfere with Reynaldo.

He was dressed all in black. His boots were silver, his gloves so thick that nothing could touch him. His heart pounded hard. He had caught fifteen creatures, but he had never freed one before. On this day, he would free everything—even the creatures caught by his imitators.

Reynaldo carried a bucket filled with seawater, and went to the fresh water grotto in the basement to see the sea witch, water elf, and mermaid. The grotto was large and deep. The walls and ceiling were made of rock so that they looked like a natural cave. The humid air smelled of dampness and despair.

They hid, as they always did when he came, but he lured them with the salt water’s scent. The sea witch rose first, her magnificent face—once the gray of a stormy ocean, now so pale as to be nearly clear—flashing with anger.

“What more can you do to us?” she asked, and as she did, he splashed her with the salt water. She sputtered, shocked, and then the gray returned to her face.

“This is a trick,” she said.

He shook his head.

She snapped her fingers, rousing her companions, then she cursed Reynaldo and vanished, leaving a small water funnel in her wake. As the water elf rose to the surface, Reynaldo splashed him as well, and then the mermaid. They didn’t vanish like the sea witch. The water elf flew away on a rain cloud, and the mermaid climbed to the side of the grotto. She stood for a moment, naked, legs in place of her tail, and then she approached him.

“May you live as I have these past eight years,” she said in her throaty voice. Then she slapped him, took his cloak, wrapped it around herself, and walked out of the room.

Reynaldo stared at the fresh water grotto for a moment, stunned at how easy it was to free its prisoners. It had taken him weeks to catch the mermaid, months to capture the water elf, and nearly a year to find the sea witch, let alone outsmart her. All that work, gone, in the space of a few moments.

He poured the remaining seawater out of the bucket. He cleaned the bucket thoroughly and filled it with fresh water. Then he went to the saltwater pools to free the nymphs and water sprites.

By mid-morning, half his prizes were gone. He felt their losses as if the collection belonged to him, not Tadeo. For the first time, Reynaldo wondered at the wisdom of his plan.

But he did not stop. He led the troll to the grotto’s bridge, gave gold to the dragon, and pocketed the scissors from the life-weaver’s room. He placed the mushroom elf on loamy ground, and gave the griffin his tail. He went through every room, reversing each capture spell until he found himself alone in the tower.

The room was round and made of stone. There was no furniture here, no windows, nothing except a pair of gold-flecked wings in a case made of glass.

He stared at them for the longest time, remembering that summer afternoon in the forest, not far from here. He had been a young man then, so young he had not known a woman and had never dreamed of love. He sat in the glade and waited for days, until the call of his soul was answered.

This was what he had feared most—this room, this reversal. And he hadn’t even admitted it to himself.

He opened the case and removed the wings. They were as soft as he remembered, and they smelled faintly of lavender, just as they had all those years ago. He brought them to his face, leaned his cheek into them, remembering that moment, that fleeting moment, when he thought the world could belong to him.

But of course it didn’t. Magic was like a sparkle, something that could be ruined by prolonged close contact. And yet, being close was all he had ever wanted.

He sighed, set the bucket down, and tucked the wings under his arm. He went down the circular staircase to the main floor of the empty tower, and let himself out.

The raindrops seemed fatter than before, colder, almost ice. The sky was black. Sometimes, when it rained like this, it felt as if the sun would never shine again.

He crossed the muddy grounds to the stable. The grooms were gone, as he had ordered.

Cara watched him approach. She was strangely motionless. He would have thought that she would have been pacing the stall in anticipation. But her blue eyes were wide, her white coat trembling, her nose quivering. Those were the only things that revealed her emotions. No one else would have seen it, but no one else knew what Reynaldo held in his hands.

There was nothing he could say—and neither could Cara. She had lost the art of speech long ago. It had been the second thing to go after he took her wings. First her horn, then her speech, and finally the unusual intelligence in those blue eyes.

He opened the stall door and placed the wings on her back, careful to put them on the proper sides. For a moment, he thought it had been too long, that they wouldn’t take. Then they slipped into her skin as if they had never left her.

Her eyes grew darker, her coat gained a sprinkling of gold, and with a twist of light, her horn returned. The air sparkled around her, as it had when she had first come to him in the glade all those years ago.

He pulled the stall door back, and stood aside. She turned her head toward him. She was beautiful again—her eyes so alive he wondered how he had ever been satisfied with what he had made her.

She brushed his face with the tip of her horn. It was soft and warm, and he could feel the magic sloughing off it. The magic burned him, like sparks from a campfire.

“In spite of myself, I am fond of you,” she said, her voice as deep and rich as the Songbird’s.

He stepped back so that she could not touch him. “You’ve been with me all this time. You know what I’ve become.”

“And I remember what you were.” She tossed her mane. More magic fell around him, burning when it touched his skin. Then she walked out of the stall and disappeared in the rain.

She did not look back, and he could not stop staring after her. It had been an impulse, the first time, a hunch. Somehow he had known that if he took her wings, she would be his forever. She had come to him, and he wanted to tell his friends about it. But he knew if he returned to his friends without her, they wouldn’t have believed him. They would have laughed. He brought her with him to prove to them that he had touched magic.

Then Tadeo saw her and demanded one of his own. But Reynaldo had lied. He had said that he was building a reputation, and would not waste his time capturing the same type of creature twice.

For a decade, he had lived up to that vow.

Now Cara was gone, walking away as if they had not spent the last ten years together. He had thought her his only remaining friend.

He had been wrong.

“I did not think you would live up to the bargain.” The Songbird was in the stall with him. She seemed brighter too—shots of gold in her brown hair, a light behind her dark eyes.

Reynaldo slipped his hand in his pocket, his fingers trembling.

“I didn’t live up to it,” he said, grabbing her and pulling her close. He wrapped one arm around her tiny little neck and held her tightly.

He could feel her heart beating rapidly, and knew he felt her fright. His fingers closed on the handle of the scissors as he took them out of his pocket and held them over her right shoulder—the very spot where her coat had bunched a few nights before.

“Prince Tadeo let me use his collection to catch you.” Reynaldo could hear her breath rasping, feel the fragility of her small bones against his.

“If you clip my wings,” she said, “you destroy more than you can imagine.”

He could feel the wings now, fluttering against him. Their feathers were sharp, scratching him.

“It’s a risk I will take,” he said, opening the scissors.

“You’ll start the war all over again. This time, your people will know they lost.”

His hand was still trembling. It took all of his strength to hold her and keep the scissors open. “What do you mean?”

“You have always been wrong.” Her voice wobbled. “You have a magic. It’s a bit of vision, nothing more. You can see edges, corners, things that are usually hidden from your people. That was how you hunted. That was how you knew how to cripple Cara.”

He flinched at the phrase. It wasn’t accurate. Cara had her wings again. She wasn’t permanently damaged.

Before he spoke, he made sure his voice held no emotion. “So?”

“So you dream,” she said, “and see what is.”

His hand slipped and he nicked her. She cried out. A spot of blood welled in the air an inch above her right shoulder. “What does that matter?”

“You’re not the first. Your people’s powers have been growing.”

“Be clearer,” he said softly, “or I will cut your wing off.”

“Your people’s new powers threaten us.”

He tightened his grip on her. Her bones felt more fragile than any bones he had ever touched. “We have always threatened you. The fact that we grow stronger should make no difference.”

She laughed. The sound was bitter. “Think. How could we, with all our magic, lose a battle against humans?”

“The rebellion?” he asked. “The Songbirds against the king? Are you saying you won?”

“We create worlds with our song. As long as we never repeat a phrase, the world holds. This one has held for a thousand years.”

He gripped the scissors tighter. “The rain isn’t natural. There hasn’t been enough sun.”

“You noticed that, but almost no one else did. They just complained.” She stirred in his arms. “And there is no rain now.”

He strengthened his hold on her, fearing it was a trick. Then he peered beyond her through the open stable door. Weak sunlight illuminated the mud and the standing water. Cara’s hoofprints, leading away from the stable, glittered like gold.

“What’s changed?” he asked.

“The magic you captured is now free.”

“Why would that make a difference?”

“You held it in thrall, diminishing it. We had less to draw on.”

“So I was defeating you all by myself.” He brought the scissors down again. “I could have destroyed you.”

“Only the illusion,” she whispered.

“And once the illusion disappeared, we would have had a chance to fight you again.”

She was silent.

“The battle must have been close,” he said. “You won by a small margin, or you would not imprison us like this. We barely remembered your existence. You would have kept us ignorant forever if you could.”

A shiver ran through her.

“What happens now?” he asked. “What if I clip your wings?”

She opened her mouth and sang a song so clear and pure that the hairs on the back of his neck rose. Around him, the stable melted away. He was standing in the middle of a clearing, very much like the one in which he had found Cara.

The air was fresh and smelled of spring, the grass was greener than any he had ever seen, the sunlight so brilliant that it hurt his eyes. He hadn’t realized how diminished his world had been.

There were creatures all around him—in the sky, on the ferns by his feet, on the flowers blooming beneath the trees. In front of him, three Songbirds—a man and two women—stood with their arms around each other. They sang in perfect harmony. Another Songbird approached, another man. For a moment, his song blended with theirs, and then one of the women bowed her head, excusing herself, and walked away. The new man took her place.

“This is a trick,” Reynaldo whispered.

“I wish it were,” his Songbird said. “But now that you see, I can’t blind you again.”

“If I let you go, you’ll let me live here.”

“Yes,” she said.

“And what of my people? They’ll stay in the darkness and rain, prisoners who have no idea that they’re imprisoned.”

“They aren’t unhappy,” she said.

“Are you so sure?” he asked. “If I dream of this place, what’s to say others don’t as well?”

He felt her stiffen beneath him. So others did dream. He wasn’t the only threat.

“Your people started the war,” the Songbird said softly. “You tried to destroy us. We barely survived.”

“That was a thousand years ago.” He was growing cold. “None of the people who harmed you live any longer.”

“But you collect us as if we were trophies,” she said. “We’re not.”

“No,” he said. “We are.”

She shuddered once and then went very still. Her heartbeat was just as rapid, just as frightened. It was the only thing that gave her away.

“I have the power to change everything, don’t I?” he asked. “To blend our worlds the way they were before.”

“You’re not ready to live with us again,” she said.

“I think we are. Your world is leaching into ours. I have powers I should not have, and your world bleeds into my dreams. Does ours bleed into yours?”

She was leaning against him as if she were having trouble standing on her own. “If you stay here and do not bring the others, you will have more magic than you ever dreamed of, riches beyond your power to imagine, beautiful women—anything. Anything at all.”

His hand was no longer trembling. “And if I refuse?”

“You will stand in both worlds, and live in neither.”

“I will control both worlds,” he said, “any time I threaten your music. It’s a stalemate. One I could end with two snips of these shears.”

“Please, don’t. The war—”

“Won’t happen. My people will be too confused, too awed by this new world. They’ve never seen real beauty. They won’t know what it is. And because of that, your people will gain power. They won’t have to sing all the time, won’t have to expend the magic to create an illusion. We—all of us—might move forward.”

“We might slaughter each other again.”

Her blood, warm and sticky, was flowing onto the arm he used to hold her.

“End your illusion,” he said, “and keep your wings.”

“It’ll be chaos.”

“Yes,” he said softly.

“You can’t stand up to us,” she said.

“I can.”

The other Songbirds were watching as if they knew that everything rested on this moment. She closed her eyes. He could feel her wings pressing against his chest.

“Stop singing,” she whispered.

Faces turned toward her, faces he hadn’t seen before. Grass elves looked up from their perches on long blades, flower sprites from their petals, acorn fairies from their leaves.

“What?” a thousand voices whispered, as faint as the wind in trees.

She sighed, then said again, “Stop singing.”

The Songbirds stared at her as if she had lost her mind. She was pressing against Reynaldo harder now, and he realized that she was growing weaker.

“Stop singing,” he said, “or I’ll let her die. What does it take? The loss of one wing? Or both? And if you lose her magic, you lose all, don’t you? She’s more powerful than all the creatures I captured combined.”

The male Songbird closed his mouth. The harmony faded, and then the female Songbird stopped, then the other male. Gradually the music stopped.

Reynaldo’s ears rang. He hadn’t heard silence before—not once in his entire life.

Then the silence ended. He heard screams and shouts, and a bellow that he recognized. Tadeo stood a few yards away, and screamed Reynaldo’s name.

Reynaldo did not answer. He didn’t have to. In this place, there was no kingdom, and Tadeo was simply a young, spoiled boy.

The Songbird let out a small sigh. Her heartbeat wasn’t as rapid. Reynaldo scooped her in his arms and carried her to the other Songbirds.

He handed her to them, and one of them carried her away through the tall grass. Reynaldo looked toward the trees and saw Cara staring at him, her eyes filled with tears. Her beauty took his breath away. He had tried to capture that beauty and failed. Holding her had nearly destroyed her.

Just as the world he’d been living in had nearly destroyed him.

He reached for her, but she vanished into the trees. He could pursue her, but to what end? She deserved a life, a free life, just like he did.

Tadeo had reached his side. His face was red with the strain of walking, his skin sheened with sweat.

“Reynaldo,” he said, “what is the meaning of this?”

“We’ve lost our home, Tadeo. We’re in the world we’ve always dreamed of.”

“I never dreamed of this,” Tadeo said.

But Reynaldo had. A world so bright and vivid that it threatened to overwhelm him. He had been right. His people would be weaker here while they learned to accept the changes. But they would learn—if the right person taught them.

“What do we do now?” Tadeo asked.

Reynaldo gazed at him for a moment—the boy who finally knew how it felt to lose everything. Tadeo couldn’t lead them here. He lacked the understanding. He lacked the vision.

He lacked the magic.

Reynaldo no longer had to answer him. The world had changed, in more ways than one.

___________________________________________

“Songbirds“ is available for one week on this site. The ebook is available on all retail stores, as well as here.

Songbirds

Copyright © 2021 by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
First published in Dragon Magazine, September, 2000
Published by WMG Publishing
Cover and Layout copyright © 2021 by WMG Publishing
Cover design by WMG Publishing
Cover art copyright © Canva

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

Anyway, I want you to enjoy all of the holiday stories that I’ve loved these past years, which is why this list exists. No

I love holiday stories of all kinds. I save up the stories to read during the season, and I find that I enjoy them more when I do this. I also love to write holiday stories. I’ve published three collections of them under my Rusch name. I write an entire Santa Series under my Kristine Grayson name. In fact, we’ve rebranded the series and will be doing a Kickstarter on it starting mid-December. (The Kickstarter will be a short one…and you’ll get your ebooks before Christmas.) We are doing the Kickstarter to celebrate the rebrand and Santa Claus Lane, the brand-new novel in the series. Notice there is no link yet. We will have one in a week or so.

Thursday (Thanksgiving), the WMG Holiday Spectacular Calendar of Stories sends out its very first story. Subscribers will get a story per day between now and New Year’s Day. The stories this year are phenomenal. You can still sign up to get yours by clicking here. If you don’t want to commit to a story per day, you can sample some of the stories. We publish a compilation of the previous year’s Calendar of Stories, and the one for 2023 just appeared. So did the single-volume anthologies. These feature stories in the same genre. In 2023, we had hardboiled stories, romance stories, and stories about secrets. You can order one or just all three. (You’ll note that we’re slowly redesigning this project as well.)

This list below is a compilation of all of the stories I’ve recommended since I started posting the Recommended Reading List. The list is growing quite long, which pleases me. I have left the descriptions as they were in the original Recommended Reading list, so some of them mention that it’s not Christmas time or something else that’s going on while I was reading. Eh. Just go with it.

I have also had to stop listing the individual authors in my tags. I just haven’t had the time to add them.

Not all of the stories are easily available any more. In the last few years, I tried to fix all of the links as well. Some had expired. But I’m keeping the listings here in case you want to search for them. I had a lot of fun revisiting the list this year. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed many of these stories. I suspect you’ll enjoy them as well.

Happy holiday reading!

HOLIDAY RECOMMENDED READING LIST

Allyn, Doug, “The Snow Angel,” Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, January, 2014. (Also in The Best American Mysteries 2015) Detective Dylan LaCrosse gets called to a crime scene outside a beautiful home. A dead girl, dressed as if she were going to prom, dies in the snow. She had waved her arms and legs before dying, and she looked like a perfect snow angel.

Somehow, Doug, who is one of our best writers, imho, manages to throw a novel’s worth of twists and turns into this fantastic story. I thought it might be simply a good Doug Allyn story (and you know you’re in the hands of a great writer when good is exactly what we expect, and we hope for more) until the last section. And that section made the story absolutely perfect. Read this one. It is a holiday crime story, but you can enjoy it year round.

Arnold, Jeremy, Christmas in the Movies, Running Press, 2018. This pretty little book provided a lot of entertainment for me in this dark year. I found some movies I hadn’t seen, so I watched them. I remembered ones I loved, and thought about watching them (which was enough). There were some delightful facts in here, and some lovely photos as well. And yes, that means I recommend you pick up the hardcover…

Baum, L. Frank, “A Kidnapped Santa Claus,” Short Stories For Christmas, Saland Publishing audiobook, 2013. I believe this story was read by Bart Wolffe, but I’m not certain, and the book listing doesn’t say which stories he read. The story itself was a revelation for me. Yes, this is L. Frank Baum, the man who wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and published it in 1900. I had no idea he wrote Santa stories, but he did, and this one, at least, is surprisingly modern. I mentioned it to Dean, and he had known about Baum’s Christmas stories. They were a surprise to me.

Some things aren’t the same, of course. Santa lives in the Laughing Valley, not the North Pole, and the elves and such are very different creatures than the ones we’re used to. But the sleigh, Santa’s midnight ride, all of that is quite modern. In this, Santa gets kidnapped on Christmas Eve and can’t make his ride. Very tense, and quite exciting. I have no idea how the story would be to read, but I found the audiobook marvelous, and worth recommending. I haven’t listened to all of the stories in the collection, but I plan to eventually.

Balogh, Mary, Someone To Trust, Jove, 2018. To be honest, I wasn’t ready to read anything at all romantic. I wanted murder and mayhem. But my favorite mystery writers disappointed me last month, so I picked up Balogh, whose work I adore.

I was worried as I started this one. It is part of a series that I’m greatly enjoying, but this book seemed very peripheral at first. The opening is set at Christmas, with a wedding from the previous book. I wouldn’t call this a holiday novel, though, although it is appropriate to read at the holidays.

Then the book switched up. Balogh usually doesn’t have villains in her novels. If someone is truly dastardly, they’re dastardly and dead. In fact, the effects of one horrible man launched this entire series. But this novel has a true villain. She’s a narcissist who showed up in previous novels, but not in a starring role. She is as believable as Balogh’s other characters, which is to say, very believable. Chilling. By the middle of the novel, I could not see how our protagonists were going to deal with her while keeping this a romance novel. (If it had been a mystery, she would have been a corpse or the murderer by the middle of the novel.)

Needless to say, Balogh pulled it off. I devoured the last part of this book, worried for our characters, and reassured, as romance novels do. A nice read for a dark time of year.

Baxter, John, Immoveable Feast: A Paris Christmas, Harper Perennial, 2008. A wonderful little erudite book about an ex-patriate Australian cooking Christmas dinner for his wife’s family in France. No pressure there.

This is beautifully written, with lots and lots and lots of great descriptions of setting and food and food and setting. Lots of history of certain customs and traditions. It even has a bit of suspense: will he get the piglet he wants for the centerpiece of the dinner, will it (or any piglet) fit in the oven in the old farmhouse, and will the family eat the finished product, made with “unusual” (read: Not French) spices? By the time I got to the piglet section, I actually cared about all of those things.

A lovely little Christmas book, and one that can be read outside of the holiday season, if you’re so inclined. The clash of cultures stuff is particularly nice.

Burton, Jaci, All She Wants For Christmas, Carina Press, 2010. I read this book at night while I was trying to read a graphically violent book. I didn’t want to read that book before bed, and this one—with a country music singer heroine—spoke to me, even though it’s not Christmas time. (I think it shows how desperate I was to get away from that book that I went not only to a romance, but a Christmas romance.)

This is the first book I’ve read by Burton. I liked it. It was heartwarming, just like it should have been. I ordered the other two books in the series the moment I finished it, which tells you she did well. In fact, she did so well, she’s the one who convinced me I didn’t need to torture myself with that other book any longer. So I didn’t. I’m reading romances again instead.

Burton, Mary, “Christmas Past,” anthology with Fern Michaels, JoAnn Ross, and Judy Duarte, Kensington Reissue 2017. I’ve clearly been in the mood for holiday mysteries and I was happy to find this one. I’d read half of this book two years ago, and finished it this year. This story is about a woman who fled (and survived) an abusive husband. He’s dead, but manages to torture her from the grave. (His plans are fiendish, and fascinating.) Well written and intriguing, this story made me look for more of her work. I wondered why I hadn’t bought any of it, since it all sounded like things I’d be interested in. And then I saw the covers. They were/are appropriate for the genre, but not to my taste. They actually sent me away from her books. I’ll see how the novels are, but this story is great. Perfect if you’re in a holiday mystery mood.

Cach, Lisa, “A Midnight Clear,” Mistletoe’d, Kindle Edition, 2011. A lovely holiday novella, set in New York at the end of the 19^th century. The period details are fun—I had no idea that was when the Christmas card habit started—and the characters are great. Catherine has spent years being wined and dined by her rich aunt, going to London, Paris, and on what was once called the Grand Tour. Catherine has met European royalty and American royalty. She wears fine clothes, and she has an eye for beauty. Sort of. Because Catherine is terribly near-sighted and too vain to wear glasses.

She comes home for Christmas, to her family’s not insubstantial house in a relatively small town, and one of her wealthy suitors follows her. But she also meets a man whom she has no idea is wealthy—William, the owner of the general store. She’s not attracted to him at first because she can’t see him, literally. Then someone (William?) buys her a pair of spectacles and has them anonymously delivered, and suddenly she can see everything much clearer.

A great deal more happens here, including a magical wish by an innocent young girl (is that where the spectacles come from?), and some proper comeuppance for a very bad person. The story is lovely, the details good, and all of it will put you in a wonderful holiday mood. Enjoy!

Cach, Lisa, “Puddings, Pastries, and Thou,” Wish List, Leisure, 2003 (also in Mistletoe’d). I have no idea where I got this anthology, which also features Lisa Kleypas, Claudia Dain, and Lynsay Sands, but I read it for two reasons: First, I’m still puttering through my Kleypas binge, and second, I always read a Christmas romance anthology over the holidays.

I have to say, though, that I really hated the design of this book. It doesn’t do what romance anthologies (heck, all anthologies) should, which is point you to the authors’ other work. In fact, the stories themselves have no byline. You have to look at the table of contents to see who wrote what.

The Cach story was a nice surprise. I’ve probably read two dozen such anthologies over the years and the stories are often sweet but predictable. This one wasn’t predictable. I’ve discovered Mary Balogh through such an anthology, and now I’ll seek out other work by Cach.

This is a witty story of a down-and-out woman whose immediate family was dead and who depends on the kindness of her distant relations. Only they stuck her with an elderly woman who had either dementia or Alzeheimers (of course, the story doesn’t say since it’s set in Regency England). She was the 24/7 caretaker, and she barely had time for herself. She also barely got enough to eat.

When the story begins, our heroine Vivian has just moved in with another set of distant relatives, and must contend with a jealous 17-year-old who is about to debut. I’m all set for a Mean Girls story—the 17-year-old doesn’t want to share her glory days with a lesser cousin—but the story doesn’t work that way.

The 17-year-old does set Vivian up with a seemingly undesirably hero, who is a bad influence not because he’s a rake or an alcoholic, but because…well, let me simply say that it has to do with morals that no longer exist. He had done something honorable in our world, but dishonorable in theirs.

The entire story centers around the feasts over the holiday, and Cach delineates them with loving care. It’s pretty clear that Vivian will go from being a bony distant relation to a fat lord’s wife, and we’re cheering for her the whole way.

And the story made me hungry for pastries. Enough said.

Cafferata, Patricia D., editor, Christmas in Nevada, University of Nevada Press, 2014. I liked this little book. It examines the history of the holiday throughout Nevada’s history, using primary sources. Primary sources means that there are a few breathtakingly racist pieces in here, mostly from the white point of view, mostly of the good-intentioned kind (let us help these poor unfortunates). Just be forewarned as you read that some of the pieces are definitely of their time.

I did like a lot in here. Most of it is ephemeral in a good way, and brings out the kind of detail that the writer in me loves. For example, people often used tumbleweeds as Christmas trees. I was thinking about that on one of my runs, and then I saw one of my neighbors a few blocks over had strung some lights on a tumbleweed on her porch. I would have just thought that weird before, but I’ll wager it was a family tradition. There’s a lot of fun stuff like that. So if you like holiday history, pick this one up.

Cantrell, Rebecca, “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,” Yultide Thrills: A Christmas Anthology, 2023. I love this story. Rebecca captured the child’s point of view beautifully. This story takes place on two levels: The child’s goals and dreams and desires and what really happened, which we as adults understand. So well done.

Cantrell, Rebecca, “Twinkle (A Joe Tesla Christmas), Yultide Thrills: A Christmas Anthology, 2023. I had a moment as I read this story. I love Rebecca Cantrell’s work, but she often violates my reader rules. I decided life’s too short to read about children or pets in jeopardy (and yes, I know. I’m a hypocrite. I put children and pets in jeopardy in my work). But for relaxation, I try to avoid those things. Rebecca has no qualms about threatening every living creature in one of her books, and sometimes she carries through with those threats. Writers, that adds to stakes.

So I started her collection of Christmas stories. I can relate to the introduction, but in it, she says the stories get progressively darker. Now realize I have not yet read her Joe Tesla novels. So I had no idea how those stories work. And what should happen right off the bat? A little girl appears with a kitten in her pocket. Now, if this were the Hannah Vogel series, I’d be super worried. Okay, I was super worried anyway. So I peeked at the ending, saw that I could tolerate it, and went back and read the entire heartwarming and remarkable tale. I loved it.

It was the only holiday story I read this year (2022). The season, as I said above, got away from me. I didn’t even get to finish the collection. But I will. It’s on my next-year holiday pile. And I may even sneak it in earlier.

Cantrell, Rebecca, Yultide Thrills: A Christmas Anthology, 2023. I started reading this collection during Christmas of 2022, when Rebecca first published it, and finished it this year (2023). I love her voice and the stories here. Some of them are very dark, which doesn’t bother me at all, but might bother some of you. I got the paper edition, and there are some design issues. You  might be better off with the ebook. Also, this is a collection of Rebecca’s work, not an anthology ( a mistake a lot of authors make), so if you expect stories from other writers, you’ll be disappointed. If you just pick it up for Rebecca’s work, though, I can promise that you won’t be disappointed at all. I think it’ll add to your holiday reading for next year.

Davis, Sam, “A Christmas Carol: Nevada Style,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. The Christmas in Nevada book starts with a short story written around 1870 or so, and tinkered with a few times. Cafferata says the version here is the original version (complete with some 19th century language). The story is about a saloon, looking for a piano player. A mysterious one shows up on Christmas. The story reminds me of Twain, and certainly shows how much he was influenced by his time here. The ending made me laugh out loud.

Dermatis, Dayle A., “Desperate Housewitches,” Uncollected Anthology: Winter Witches, Soul’s Road Press, 2014. I’m behind on some of my Uncollected Anthology reading from the previous group (including Dayle’s story), but I couldn’t pass this one up, just based on the title.

Trust Dayle to write a winter holiday story about the solstice and magic. She manages to combine the claustrophobia of a suburban neighborhood with the competitiveness that women sometimes engage in with holiday ritual. Only the holiday ritual here isn’t decorating a Christmas tree or singing carols (although there is a discussion of carolers that made me chuckle). Nope. This one is about pagan rituals. The story’s wonderful, funny, and a do-not-miss.

Dubé, Marcelle, McKell’s Christmas, Falcon Ridge Publishing, Kindle edition. 2013. McKell, a cop in Manitoba, finally gets a Christmas Eve off. He has dinner with his girlfriend’s friends. One friend brings a new boyfriend, and tensions rise—just not in the way you’d expect. The Canadian setting is real, the mystery is fascinating, and the characters excellent. Pick this one up.

Dubé, Marcelle, Running Away From Christmas, Falcon Ridge Publishing, Kindle edition, 2012. I read this one after the holiday because I simply couldn’t wait until next year. Faith can’t take another Christmas alone, so she runs away to Vancouver B.C., where…well, I’d like to say the holiday stalks her, but it’s not quite like that. It’s sweeter. A wonderful story, no matter the time of year.

Fry, Hannah and Evans, Thomas Oléron, The Indisputable Existence of Santa Claus: The Mathematics of Christmas, The Overlook Press, 2016. A dense but fun little book that uses math to prove all kinds of things like Santa exists. Maybe. Kinda. Not in the way you’d expect. And how to wrap gifts properly. and how to divide dessert, and win at Monopoly, and many other fun things associated with the holidays. The book is pretty too, so I’d suggest the tiny hardcover edition.

Green, John, “A Cheertastic Christmas Miracle,” Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. Okay, I get it now. This is the first story I’ve read of megaseller John Green’s, and it’s a lot of fun. This is one of three linked holiday romances in the Let It Snow volume, and is perhaps the liveliest one.

Set in the middle of a Christmas blizzard, three friends get called by another friend to get to the Waffle House ASAP because a trainload of cheerleaders (literally) are stranded there. The adventure is the journey to the Waffle House, and all the character arcs, etc., punctuated by reports from the Waffle House itself. Extremely fun, extremely memorable story.

Hallinan, Timothy, “Chalee’s Nativity,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. Amazing story about two orphans on the streets of Bangkok. Apparently, Chalee has appeared in Hallinan’s work before. Well written, heartbreaking in a good way. Worth the price of admission.

Herron, Mick, “The Usual Santas,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. The title story of this wonderful collection is a title story for a reason. A group of Santas working at a disreputable mall discover a problem among them. When Dean and I teach, we talk about writer stages—Stage One Writers are learning grammar, etc. Stage Four writers have learned their craft and have added some tools to the bargain. Stage Four Writers break lots of rules because they know how.

Herron is Stage Four, and this story shows why. With the exception of one minor character named Joe, everyone else in the story is named Santa. And they have dialogue with each other attributed to Santa. And it all works beautifully. I love this story. I wish I had written this story. I wish I could read it for the first time all over again. Wonderful and worth the price of admission.

Hockensmith, Steve, “Fruitcake,” Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. I love Steve Hockensmith’s short stories, partly because they’re so memorable. I couldn’t get fruitcake out of my mind for days—much as I wanted to. I’m not fond of fruitcake. Many others aren’t either which is the impetus for this story of regifting and murder.

Hockensmith, Steve “Naughty,” Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. Funny story about a down-on-her-luck woman, Christmas “elves,” a department store, and a rather unexpected crime. Fun and memorable.

Hockensmith, Steve, Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. I have no idea how many of Steve Hockensmith’s short stories I’ve read in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine or in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine over the years. Quite a few, judging by the ones I remembered and reread in this collection. It’s a collection of Steve’s Christmas stories, all of which I liked, many of which I loved. Even the copyright page is funny. My only quibble with the volume? In it, Steve mentions he’s too busy to write short fiction these days. So I say, Stop sleeping, Steve! Write your books, but write short stories too. Whatever it takes. Maybe it takes y’all to buy this book to get him to write more short stories. So do it.

Hunter, Madeline, “A Christmas Abduction,” Seduction on a Snowy Evening, Kensington Books, 2019. This comes from another of those anthologies that weirdly does not give the editor credit. Oh, I hate that.

The anthology has three novellas, along with excerpts from upcoming novels, which I mostly skipped. I bought the anthology because of a different author, but this is the story that I found memorable. I’d heard a lot about Madeline Hunter, but I’ve never read her work before (that I remember). She managed to set up a heartbreaking scenario for our heroine, one that our hero understands without her telling him about it, because he already knew bits and pieces of the story. He just put it all together for her.

Novellas a tricky, particularly a romance novella with villains, which this one has. Hunter pulled off the villain in a way that I had expected only because I’m a writer, and because I realized about 20 pages from the end there’s only one person who could be the villain. But she did the work delicately and in a delightful manner.

If you like holiday novellas, you’ll like this one. It’s like no other that I’ve read.

James, Eloisa, “A Mistletoe Kiss,” Mistletoe Christmas, Avon, 2021. I bought this anthology when it came out and then kinda forgot about it. I remember picking it up the next year, looking at the god-awful cover and assuming it was indie published and probably had a bad interior design. I didn’t even look to double-check. This year, I did double-check, and realized that nope, this is an Avon book with a bad interior design and a terrible cover. And it was an anthology, not a group novel, which I had also assumed.

The novellas in the book are linked to each other by setting and one event. It’s a Christmas revelry, sponsored by a dying duke. Every one of the four authors who have written for this have set their stories at that party. I had high hopes for all of the novellas, but only two are worth recommending.

This one, by Eloisa James, is the best in the book and an absolute delight. Turns out that the duke’s daughter has been the one who has put on this amazing gathering for the past several years, making it the party of the season. There’s a lot of great family interaction here, a wonderful romance at the heart of it, and believable misunderstanding. Really well done.

James, P.D., The Mistletoe Murder And Other Stories, Knopf, 2016. This tiny little book pleased me in a thousand ways, and made me sad. First, the pleasing part(s): the stories, the design, the way it felt in my hands. I loved the attention to detail here.

The part that made me sad? P.D. James died in 2014, and will not be writing any new books. I suspect the estate might approve more things like this, and I’ll read it all, but it won’t be the same. After I finished this, I thought that I might reread some of her books. Can’t decide if I will or not. I remember them so vividly…

My one complaint with the volume is that there is no copyright page that lists where the stories were first published. I love that kind of information and am sad to see that Knopf left it out.

Anyway, this volume is wonderful and worth reading. I’m going to highlight a couple of the stories that I loved below. Surprisingly, to me anyway, the stories without her usual main character Adam Dalgliesh were the ones I preferred. Maybe because those were atypical cozies. I dunno.

James, P.D., “The Mistletoe Murder,” The Mistletoe Murder And Other Stories, Knopf, 2016. The title story of this collection is the title story for a reason. This is a very strong mystery, filled with honest misdirection (meaning it was all there in plain sight, but still hard to see) and great characters. A long-time mystery writer reflects on a strange family Christmas she attended in 1940. I love the discussion of mysteries versus real life murders, and all kinds of tiny details. If I say much more, I’ll ruin it.

James, P.D., Sleep No More, , Knopf, 2017. I have no idea who is handling P.D. James’s estate, but kudos to whomever is. This is the second year that the estate has released a group of previously uncollected short stories in a beautiful edition just in time for the holiday season. None of the stories struck me as spectacular James, but regular James is still better than most writers out there. The opening story, “The Yo-Yo,” stopped me right at the beginning and made me check when it was first published. Not because it was dated, but because the observation at the beginning—that a simple item, found after death, might seem to have sentimental value, and that value might be completely misconstrued. That’s an observation someone older has, not someone young. And sure enough, she wrote that story in her 70s. Some of the stories here are Christmas stories, a few are not. All are worth reading.

Johnson, Craig, “In The Land of The Blind,” The Best American Mystery Stories 2017, edited by John Sanford, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017. I haven’t read any of Johnson’s Longmire series, until I read this short story. A short holiday tale without the usual holiday sappiness. In fact, a drug addict takes some people hostage in a church on Christmas Eve. The way that the hostage situation gets resolved is one of the most logical things I’ve seen. Well done.

Johnson, Maureen, “The Jubilee Express,” Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. Jubilee’s parents get arrested in a brawl at a collectibles store the day before Christmas, so they send her to spend the holiday with her grandparents. She has to take a train, which stalls in the middle of a blizzard in a small town. She doesn’t want to sit in the cold train for hours (and maybe days) so she hikes in the snow to the Waffle House, followed by a gaggle of cheerleaders. I thought I had the story figured out twice, and I was wrong both times. Loads and loads of fun, with great characters and lots of heart.

Kaaberbøl, Lene, and Friis, Agnete, “When The Time Came,” translated by Mark Kline, The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. A dark and brooding story featuring the duo’s main character, Nina Borg. Thieves break into what they believe to be an empty building during the holidays, only to discover someone in extreme distress. If I say much more I ruin it. But suffice to say I had no idea how this would end up, and loved the way that it resolved.

Klavan, Andrew, “The Advent Reunion,”Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, January, 2011. A Christmas ghost story that packs a heck of a punch. Very short, very powerful. If I say any more, I’ll ruin it.

Kleypas, Lisa, Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor, St. Martin’s Paperback, 2011. I saved this one for my holiday reading. In fact, I bought it in October when it first came out—and honestly, I could’ve read it then, despite the title. Because this isn’t a Christmas story; it’s a fall holidays story. Halloween makes a major appearance and Thanksgiving is hilarious, even though the book itself isn’t funny, but heartwarming.

Holly’s mother died in April, leaving Holly’s uncle Mark as her guardian. Mark has never been around children, doesn’t know what to do, but he enlists his brother Sam, and together they try to make a home for this poor little girl who has given up speaking since her mother’s sudden death. Six months later—in September—Holly writes a letter to Santa: she wants a mom for Christmas. Not that Mark wants to marry or anything. You get the rest of the plot, of course.

But the book is set on the San Juan Islands in Washington State, and it’s clear that Kleypas lives in the Northwest because the details are great. The characters are even better, from Holly to Mark to Maggie, the young widow who has just started a toy store. Realistic, sensitive, and touching. You can read this one at any season of the year (but fall would be best).

Kroupa, Susan, “Walter’s Christmas-Night Musik,” Laurel Fork Press, Kindle Edition, 2010. A wonderful story about Christmas Night visitors. Unlike the previous Christmas night visitor stories you’ve read, these visitors are a surprise. I’d like to be visited by these folks. I found myself thinking about this story long after I finished reading it.

Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. I normally label books by author, but I have no idea how to label this one, because it’s listed in three different ways on the three different websites I went to. So I gave up and did this.

Let It Snow is a series of linked holiday romances written for young adults, but really, who cares who the target market is? The stories work. All three of them are good, but the first two are so good that I found myself a bit disappointed with the third. Had I read it as a standalone, I probably would have loved it.

The sense of teenagers at loose ends on the night before Christmas in a blizzard comes through all of the stories. The romances are believable, the stories powerful, and the settings wonderfully done. If you need some holiday reading, pick up this book.

Levine, Laura, “The Dangers of Candy Canes,” Candy Cane Murder, Kensington, 2007. I love Laura Levine’s voice. I wasn’t in the mood for saccharine stories in 2020, and while this story is a cozy, the voice takes it out of the sweetly simpering. I started the story on Christmas Eve Day at breakfast and tore through the entire thing, often chuckling out loud.

Levine, Laura, “Nightmare on Elf Street,” Secret Santa, Zebra, 2013. The voice in this piece caught me from the very beginning. In fact, I read it before I read anything else in the volume and, as a stickler for reading anthologies in order, that’s truly saying something.

A freelance ad writer thinks she’s going to get an advertising account; instead, through mishaps, she gets hired as a Santa’s Elf at Toyland. She doesn’t correct the mistake because she needs the money. The story’s a typical cozy—a rather bloodless (deserved) murder, lots of suspects, and a goodly amount of humor.

I laughed, fell in love with the cat, and enjoyed the situation. I’ll be looking for Levine’s other books, which is exactly what novellas like this should make me do.

Lovesey, Peter, “The Haunted Crescent,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. A delightful Christmas ghost story with a twist that I never saw coming. I shall say no more, except to remind you to go and read this one.

Lyons, Kay, The Crash Before Christmas, Kindred Spirits Publishing, Kindle edition, 2011. A delightful Christmas romance. I figured out what was going on at the end of chapter three, but most readers won’t. This novel, about a bush pilot who crashes in a blizzard and is rescued by a mysterious woman, is occasionally creepy, and very suspenseful. It’s a great holiday read; I suspect you’ll enjoy it year-round.

Macomber, Debbie, Jack Frost, Debbie Macomber Inc., 2023. I find it fascinating that Debbie Macomber, once the queen of romance, self-published a Christmas novella. Once upon a time, her publisher(s) would pair her stories with the stories of other writers so those writers would get sampled by Debbie’s audience and that would boost their sales. Not so much anymore, I guess.

This is a classic Macomber holiday story. A holiday situation, two somewhat prickly characters, and a holiday solution. She is a master at combining holidays and romance. In this one, a woman misjudges her new coworker until they get stuck together one night when the power goes out. The journey to the happily ever after is not predictable, and the novella is fun.

Macomber, Debbie, Twelve Days of Christmas, Ballantine Books, 2017. I have no idea how I’ve never read a Debbie Macomber book before. I’m not even sure I’ve read one of her Christmas books, and she’s the queen of Christmas romance. I have a hunch I thought I wouldn’t like the novels, because they’d be overly religious and dealing with people I didn’t want to read about.

This one caught my eye in the grocery store, of all places. I read the back cover blurb, and immediately picked up the book. Julia has troubles with her grumpy (and gorgeous) neighbor. She decides to kill him with kindness and blog about it for twelve days. Of course, this is fraught with issues. The blog’s witty, the characters are real, the situation is uncomfortable. I read the book in an evening, and found the novel charming. I’m not going to run out and buy all the back Christmas books of Debbie’s, but I’ll read a few when I find them. This was a lovely way to start my holiday season. The book is worth your time.

MacDonald, John D., “Dead on Christmas Street,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime, 2013. This story, first published in 1952, feels surprisingly contemporary. A woman dives out of a seventeen-story window. The death gets investigated, of course. The forensic details are accurate for the time, and the entire attitude expressed here feels like something someone could have written now. MacDonald was/is a master, and stories like this prove why.

McBain, Ed, “All Through The House,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime, 2013. This is an 87th Precinct story of McBain’s that I hadn’t read before. It’s Christmas Eve, and Carella is alone in the precinct. People continue to show up, seemingly re-enacting the Nativity. But it’s McBain, so emphasis on “seemingly.” I loved this story. You will too.

McPherson, Catriona, “Mrs. Tilling’s Match,” Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November/December, 2020. “Mrs. Tilling’s Match” is part of the Dandy series that McPherson writes. I’ve never read the series, but this story stood alone just fine. (I have a hunch I might have missed a thing or two, but still…) The story is set at Christmas 1934, and deals with a note that the cook of the family receives. It’s emotional and creepy, in a good way, and the tension was quite surprising. Looks like I’ll have to investigate some of her books.

Meier, Leslie, “Candy Canes of Christmas Past,” Candy Cane Murder, Kensington, 2007. I have no idea when I first started this book, but I note that I recommended Laura Levine’s story in 2020. Which means I haven’t picked it up since then. So…four years later…I was in the mood for cozies again at holiday time, I guess.

Leslie Meier’s story features her regular heroine, Lucy Stone, in a story that takes place in two time periods—when she is a grandmother and her kids and grandkids come to visit, and when she’s a young mother, dealing with a new home and a toddler, while pregnant in a new town. The house is a fixer-upper and it’s falling apart around her, yet she makes time to solve an old crime involving glass candy canes. The 1980 details are marvelous, the discomfort of advanced pregnancy plain, and the stress on young parents also vivid. The mystery is meh, but I always find that with cozies. The read, though, was great.

Morgan, Sarah, Miracle on 5th Avenue, HQN, 2016. Eva’s upbeat grandmother taught her to be the sunshine in every dark room. So when her grandmother dies, Eva doesn’t know how to grieve. She’s going to spend the holidays house-sitting (and decorating) a penthouse apartment on 5th Avenue.

Said apartment belongs to Lucas, a thriller writer, whose wife died suddenly. Lucas hasn’t told anyone that he failed to take the scheduled trip out of town, so when Eva shows up–in the middle of a blizzard, natch–she encounters the Big Bad Crime Writer.

Funny, wry, charming, with tons of insights about writing and the perils of falling for a writer. Don’t know how I missed Sarah Morgan, but I have a lot of reading to catch up on.

Nordeen, Juliet, New Year’s Shenanigans, 2019. The first full length book in the Modesta Quinn series finds our heroine investigating a break-in at a legal pot-growing facility in the rainy New Year up in Washington State. Modesta Quinn made her first appearance in our Holiday Spectacular, solving a crime around Christmas. I loved that story, and had high hopes for the novel. It more than lived up to my expectations. Lots of great procedures, marvelous descriptions, a good plot with some surprising twists, and excellent characters. I hope Juliet continues with this series, because I’ll continue to read it.

Page, Norvell, “Crime’s Christmas Carol,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. I’m sure Dean had heard of Norvell Page, but I never had. Page was a prolific writer for the pulps in the 1930s. This story was first published in 1939, and was a riff on O Henry’s “Gift of the Magi,” only with a heck of a criminal twist. Yet somehow Page managed to pull off a happy ending. The story becomes more poignant when you remember that it was written and published during the Depression.

Patterson, Irette Y., “Worth,” Saturday Evening Post, December 19, 2014. A lovely short Christmas piece by Irette. I read it on Christmas Eve, and it really added to an already special day. A short story about money, holidays, and love. This one’s good any time of year.

Patterson, Kent, “The Wereyam,” A Fantastic Holiday Season, edited by Kevin J. Anderson, WordFire Press, 2013. Kevin put together a holiday anthology of the stories that the writers who used to gather for our Christmas holiday parties wrote and read to each other for those gatherings. Kent’s “The Wereyam” is one of my favorites, so when the book arrived, I sat down and reread this story immediately. It not only holds up, it’s better than I remember.

We lost Kent in 1995, and while it was hard on all of us personally, I think of the loss to writing, and I mourn. He was just getting started in what would have been a fantastic career, and he died suddenly. I’m so glad that this story has been reprinted. Take a look. See if you don’t love it too.

Penzler, Otto, The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. It took me four holiday seasons to finish this book, not because it was a slog to read, but because there were so many stories. And they were mostly to my taste. I think I skipped maybe three of them completely. The book is nearly 700 pages long, and the pages are in columns, so it probably would have been 1400 to 1500 pages long if the design was different.

Usually I complain about how the best American series is laid out, and Otto is the series editor for the mystery volume. But he has no say in the editorial layout: that’s clearly mandated by the publisher. All of Otto’s other anthologies have narrative flow.

This one has a great editorial conceit. The book is divided into sections. For example, the book starts with the section “A Cozy Little Christmas” and ends with “A Classic Little Christmas.” As is appropriate for a book that covers the entire genre, the book starts with an Agatha Christie story (Peroit) and ends with another (Marple). In the middle of the book there are a wide variety of other sections, from “A Scary Little Christmas” to “A Modern Little Christmas.” My tastes veer away from cozy and classic, so my favorite parts of the book were in the middle.

I was disappointed to come to the end of the book. I had been at reading it for so long that it had become a holiday tradition for me. Unfortunately, I have a great memory for stories, and I rarely read any twice. Otherwise, I would start all over again next year. Great volume. Lots of fun. Pick it up.

Peters, Ellis, “The Trinity Cat,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. This particular story, originally published in 1976, the story is about a real cat acting in a real cat way. Set on Christmas Eve in a small English village, the story features an older woman’s murder, a tight cast of characters, and some wry observations. It’s a cozy, but not a light or funny one. I enjoyed it a great deal.

Reed, Annie, “The Case of the Missing Elf,” Thunder Valley Press, Kindle Edition, 2010. One of the nice things about the revolution in e-publishing is that you can buy a single short story of an author’s work just as a sample. I already knew that I liked Annie Reed’s stories, but I also know she’s not a household name. I hope that changes.

This is one of her Dee and Diz fantasy detective stories. Diz is an elf, although not a traditional one, and Dee is a woman with an added gift. There’s a bit of romantic tension involved, but that’s not at the heart of this story. Like so many stories on this month’s list, this is a Christmas tale. And the missing elf is not the Jolly Old One, but his occasional impersonator, Norman. Fun, and thought-provoking, in a Christmasy kinda way. It’s a nice introduction to Annie’s work.

Reed, Annie, “Essy and The Christmas Kitten,” Kindle edition, Thunder Valley Press, 2011. This story is not as sweet as the title implies. Instead, it is a bit dark and moody, so much so that I read with one eye half closed, worried that something would go wrong. But it is a Christmas story in the best way, and quite memorable. One of my best Christmas reads this year.

Reed, Annie, “Roger’s Christmas Wish,” Kindle Edition, Thunder Valley Press, 2010. Somehow I missed this in last year’s Christmas reading. Young Roger’s grandmother moved in with him, taking his room. His parents are unhappy, and so is Roger. All he wants for Santa to do is make his grandmother leave. The story is sweet, with unexpected twists. It’s also a nicely done e-book. I read it in the Kindle app on my iPad and it felt like I was reading a real book. Nicely done.

Reed, Annie, The New Year That Almost Wasn’t, A Diz & Dee Mystery, Thunder Valley Press, 2013. I love Diz & Dee so much that I bought one of the stories for Fiction River: Unnatural Worlds. So, imagine my surprise when I discovered that about a year ago, Annie had written one and I had missed it! I ordered it immediately, read it immediately, and enjoyed immensely.

The woman pregnant with the New Year’s baby goes missing. Not the first baby born in the year, but the baby who will become the ancient guy by December 31. Great concept, and it becomes even greater when we find out what happens to the ancient guy when his job is done. I’m not going to spoil it. Read this one.

Ridley, Erica, “Mischief and Mistletoe,” Mistletoe Christmas, Avon, 2021. The other well done novella in this volume comes from Erica Ridley. The story features a young woman whose mother fears she will never marry, but the woman herself is more interested in her writing than she is in any kind of relationship. In fact, she fears that the relationship might end her writing forever. I haven’t seen this conflict before in a Regency romance, and found it intriguing. This (and the James) are worth the price of the book.

Ross, Barbara, “Logged On,” Yule Log Murder, anthology with Leslie Meier, and Lee Hollis, Kensington, 2018. Surprisingly tense story about baking, of all things. Julia Snowden wants to make a french dessert called Bûche de Noël, but she can’t pull it off. Then her mother reminds her that an elderly neighbor used to make it for Christmases past, and it was good. Thing is, as Julia learns to bake with her neighbor, she also learns that a lot of people the neighbor knows have died of gastric issues around the holidays. Is the cranky elderly woman a serial poisoner? Or is something else going on?

I did not see the ending coming, which is lovely and surprising and fun for me. And the writing is excellent, and just thinking about the story makes me hungry. One of my favorite reads of December.

Ross, Dalton & Snierson, Dan, “Let’s Make A Christmas Movie! (Or Not)” Entertainment Weekly, December, 2021. This article is for everyone who has watched one of the roughly 150 Christmas movies that come out on Lifetime, Hallmark, Netflix and other channels, and thought, “I can do that!” EW “tasked” (their word) to write and pitch a holiday movie, which they did. Their experiences should be a lesson to all of you who want a career writing screenplays. Make sure you have a strong backbone and can take criticism. And stuff your know-it-all side into a closet somewhere. Really worth reading, for writers and non-writers alike.

Ross, JoAnn, “Dear Santa,” Silver Bells anthology with Fern Michaels, Mary Burton, and Judy Duarte, Kensington Reissue 2017. I found this volume in a discount store. Originally, the book came out in 2008, but apparently, it’s been reissued. I was getting pretty burned out on Christmas stories by the time I picked this up. The only reason I started JoAnn’s story is because I like her work and because it was about a mystery writer. The writer’s name is Holly Berry, and there’s an actual reason for that. Not a funny reason. A sad and heartwarming one.

Anyway, Holly gets caught in a snow storm in the mountains and sees a reindeer cross her path (Blitzen?). Then she crashes her SUV. Of course, she’s rescued by a hunk of a man who also happens to have the world’s cutest daughter. He’s mayor of the most Christmassy town in the United States, and owns an inn. And in the context of the story, all of this is believable. And wonderful. And charming.

And…and…I cried at the end. Not a delicate little tear running down the side of my face, no. A gasp-y sobby kind of crying that only a few authors have achieved for me in the past—at least with something sweet. So pick up a copy of this book. The paperback is super cheap right now, so if you prefer that format, it’s cheaper than the ebook.

Runyon, Damon, “Dancing Dan’s Christmas,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. Every time I read a Damon Runyon story, I realize how much I enjoy his work. I just never seem to seek him out. I’m not sure why. I loved this one as well. First published in Collier’s in 1932, this story is firmly set in its era. It begins in a speakeasy, involves a drunken pact, and…works. Somehow. I loved it.

Seabrook, John, Jingle Bell Pop, Narrated by Erin Moon, Audible Studios, 2018. I don’t recommend audiobooks often, because I spend half my listening time on podcasts. But a friend recommended this, and I do have an Audible membership, so I downloaded it.

Jingle Bell Pop was one of the free selections for December 2018. I assume it’ll still be available after that.

It’s a behind-the-scenes of the business of Christmas carols. I knew a lot of the stories, but the modern ones, I did not know. The author interviewed songwriters, and calls Christmas pop hits “an annuity.” Yep. If the contracts were good, the writers earned and earned and still earn. Writers should listen to this one, just to see how copyright can be your friend. The book is an hour and 14 minutes long. Well worth listening to.

Shalvis, Jill, “Bah, Handsome!” Merry and Bright, Kensington, 2019. An early Jill Shalvis holiday novella that has most of what I love about her writing. (Not enough goofy animals, though.) Hope runs a B&B, and the lawyer for her mean-as-sin brother who loaned her money arrives to collect. In the middle of a snowstorm. During the holidays. Yes, yes, you know how it will end, but there sure is a lot of tension and how-will-this-resolve? in the journey. Lots of fun.

Shalvis, Jill, Hot Winter Nights, Avon, 2018. I really have no idea how Shalvis makes her characters so winning, but she does. Molly Malone, the office manager for other characters in this series, wants to take an active part in investigations. Everyone else tries to thwart her. But she has two elderly elves who claim that something’s fishy at Santa’s Village, and she’s going to investigate. Lucas Knight doesn’t want her to, but knowing she won’t stop, he decides to help.

Some of the scenes in here are laugh-out-loud funny, especially as the elderly elves speak their minds. But there’s a lot of tension too, when it becomes clear that those elves were on to something. One of the most fun things I read all month.

Shalvis, Jill, The Trouble With Mistletoe, Avon, 2016. I bought this book last year and pulled it off my TBR shelf this year, after finishing something particularly bad and particularly dark. The book was the perfect antidote to that awful, dark novel. Shalvis has an incredible voice, and she creates spectacular characters, including the four-footed ones.

Willa owns South Bark, a pet shop that specializes in grooming and pet care. She’s covered in “puppies and poo” when who should walk in but Keane, the guy who stood her up on the only date she tried to have in high school. To make matters worse, he doesn’t remember her. His great-aunt dumped her tempermental cat on him because the aunt was having a health crisis and had no one else to turn to. He needs to board the cat, at least while he’s at work, because the cat—named Petunia by the aunt, rechristened PITA by Keane (Pain in the ass)—tends to show her displeasure by ruining anything she touches when she’s alone.

The meet-cute is so cute, I read it to Dean. Beneath the fun plot are serious issues, from abandonment to loveless middle class households to building your own family. I was halfway done with the book when I ordered the rest in the Heartbreaker Bay series. I had to refrain from ordering everything she wrote, because she’s written a lot. I’ve already worked my way through this book and a novella (which is fun and too slight to recommend), and I’m starting into another tonight. So, yeah. Read this. Everyone is great. Including PITA.

Smith, Dean Wesley, “Jukebox Gifts,” WMG Publishing, Kindle edition, 2010. I love Dean’s jukebox stories. The conceit is this: for the duration of a single song, played on a jukebox, the person who chose the story can time travel to their strongest memory of that song—and maybe change the past. “Jukebox Gifts” is set at Christmas and is both heartwarming and heartwrenching.

Tursten, Helen, “An Elderly Lady Seeks Peace at Christmastime,” translated by Marlaine Delargy,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. Delightful story about a regular character of Tursten’s named Maud. Maud is an octogenarian who uses people’s prejudices to change the world around her. She just wants a quiet Christmas, and she’ll resort to anything to get it. I’m definitely looking for more of Tursten’s work (preferably translated by Delargy, who found a perfectly wry voice for Maud).

Unknown, “Josephine and The Scary Santa: A Jarbridge Christmas,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. While I love the Christmas in Nevada book, it’s also deeply irritating. I have no idea when or where some of these pieces came from, nor do I know who wrote them. It’s clear, from the different voices, that Cafferata did not write most of the summaries. They might be from newspapers, but which ones and when is pretty unclear, even from the introductions.

This particular true story is about how little Josephine Cooper and her family spent one Christmas in Jarbridge in the early 1920s. Very short, and very delightful.

Unknown, “The Richest Christmas: Snowbound on the Swallow Ranch,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. This particular incident happened in 1923. Five-year-old Sheldon Olds lived on the ranch with his father, who worked there. A blizzard came in at Christmas time and no one could leave to celebrate, so the Swallows held a celebration for everyone stuck on the ranch.

Sheldon was particularly terrified because he and one of the Swallow children had actually set fire to some straw in the barn about a month before. They had to hide in the sheep dip to avoid punishment. This story is about the repercussions during his meeting with Santa. Charming little piece.

The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. I loved this book and gave it to a number of Christmas-story loving friends. It’s beautifully designed, with lots of great extras inside. Visual extras. And there’s no editor listed, which pisses me off because clearly, someone edited this book, and put a lot of thought into it. The someone divided the stories by type (“acts of kindness”; “the darkest of holiday noir”) and put together a pleasing order of wonderful authors. This is a spectacular little book, worth every moment you spend with it.

Westlake, Donald, “The Burglar and The Whatsis,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. First published in Playboy in 1966, this story is as much sf as it is mystery. If I say much more about the story, I’ll spoil it. It’s very short, it has a couple of twists, and it made me laugh. In fact, it’s my favorite story in the volume so far (which isn’t saying a great deal, since I only managed about 100 pages of this massive tome before I stopped to save the rest for next holiday season).

Westlake, Donald, “Give Till It Hurts” Christmas at The Mysterious Bookshop, edited by Otto Penzler, Vangard Press, 2010. Losing Westlake was a tragedy. I love his Dortmunder stories and this one, written for the customers of Otto Penzler’s Mysterious Bookshop, is marvelous. Laugh out loud funny, as most Dortmunder stories are.

White, Ethel Lina, “Waxworks,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. Ethel Lina White wrote seventeen novels, two of which became classic films, The Lady Vanishes and The Spiral Staircase. I hadn’t heard of her until I encountered this story, but it soon became clear why Hitchcock felt her to be a kindred spirit.

Sonia, a young reporter, has decided to make her reputation by spending New Year’s Eve in the Waxworks, ostensibly to catch the haunt or whatever it is that was causing all the spooky noises. She describes herself as “not timid” and “fairly perceptive” and believes she can solve this mystery.

Only things get a little more mysterious as time goes on. Someone dies, and some really spooky occurrences happen, and Sonia…well, read this. You’ll soon forget, as I did, that it was written in 1930. I actually pictured a waxworks I’d been to recently as I read it. Probably the most memorable story of the volume for me so far.

Willis, Connie, “All About Emily,” Asimov’s, December, 2011. (Also in A Lot Like Christmas) For years, Connie Willis’s holiday stories, published in Asimov’s, were part of my Christmas traditions. Then, she got deeply involved in her excellent novels, All Clear and Blackout (which I recommended earlier), and she stopped writing any short fiction at all. Which is, I think, a crime. I love Connie’s novels, but I adore her short work.

“All About Emily” riffs on the movie All About Eve, and explains the film for those of you who missed that marvelous classic. The story is set in New York at Christmas, and our heroine is the aging actress who might be threatened by a new up-and-comer, Emily. And yet, something about that girl….

It’s a fun story, especially if you love old movies, Broadway, theater, and New York at Christmas time. And it manages to be good science fiction as well. It’s nice to have you back, Connie. Please continue writing short fiction while doing your novels.

Willis, Connie, A Lot Like Christmas, Del Rey, 2017. I had completely missed this book when it first came out. It’s a collection of Connie Willis’s Christmas stories. An expansion, really, of her original collection, Miracle and Other Christmas Stories, which I have. I looked to see if I was doing the recommended reading when that book came out, and realized I hadn’t been. So here’s what I’m going to do: I’m going to recommend this collection, because it’s wonderful and full of stories that I just love, like “Newsletter” and “Epiphany.” But I read those stories so long ago that I can’t really comment on them well. So here’s the thing…any story in this collection that was either in Asimov’s in the last century or in Miracle gets my vote.

I read the ones that were published elsewhere or which had a more recent copyright date when I got my hands on this particular collection. I also read all the essays. I am recommending individual pieces from that particular subset of things. Oh, and I wrote about “All About Emily” in a very early Recommended Reading List from November of 2011. (It also shows up in the annual holiday list every year.)

In other words, you’ll find a few Willis stories singled out in this Recommended Reading list, but don’t view them as the only good ones in this collection. They’re all good. Some are just more to my taste than others.

And one other thing…the recommendations at the back. I don’t agree with a lot of them because apparently my taste and Connie’s diverge on the best holiday fare, but that’s great. It allowed me to rethink some of my likes and dislikes. I suspect they’ll do the same for you.

Willis, Connie, “Just Like The Ones We Used To Know,” A Lot Like Christmas, Del Rey, 2017. Maybe my favorite of all of Connie’s Christmas stories, this story is about a truly unlikely snowfall and the power of wishes. It’s lovely.

Willis, Connie, “Now Showing,” A Lot Like Christmas, Del Rey, 2017. I love this story, although it does feel like it was set 100 years ago instead of ten years ago. That’s how much has changed. It makes me nostalgic for a time when movie theaters were teen hangouts and social media was…different. The story is fun, and worth reading, even though it feels like something much older than it is.

Willis, Connie, “Take A Look At The Five And Ten,” Asimov’s Science Fiction, November/December, 2020. The arrival of a new Connie Willis tale is always great news. This is one of her holiday novellas. It’s good, but not great, Willis. Good Willis is still five times better than what anyone else is doing. Well worth your time. I have included a link to the Subterranean edition, which looks pretty.

Yi, Melissa,“Blue Christmas,” Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, January/February, 2019. Melissa Yi, a doctor, writes a good series about Hope Sze, also a doctor. In this story, Hope goes to Christmas party, and observes things the rest of us never would. Lots of misdirection here, very well done, and some marvelous character building, with a lot of tension. And the meaning of blue…well, you’ll see.

The collection features a brand-new, never-before-seen novella about Spade and Paladin, called “The Case of the Purloined Pages.”

If you’ve never read a Spade story before, you have a chance by reading this week’s Free Fiction Monday story, “The Case of the Stolen Memories,” which is also in the book.

Here’s the blurb for the collection:

Explore the world of science fiction fandom as Secret Master of Fandom and private detective Spade solves crime after crime in this latest collection of stories.

Featuring two of masterful author Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s most popular characters: Spade and Paladin (Spade’s enigmatic sidekick and infamous detective for hire), these delightful stories include “The Really Big Ka-Boom,” “At Witt’s End,” “Unity Con,” “The Case of the Stolen Memories,” and the never-before-published “The Case of the Purloined Pages.”

Find out why Mystery Scene Magazine says: “I hope to read many more stories about Spade and Paladin.”

You can get the print book anywhere books are sold. The ebook is also available on all ebook sites, including our own, which is here.

I was, in the parlance of children, eight-and-a-half. Apollo 8 had left Earth’s orbit and was the first crewed spaceflight to fly to the Moon. They orbited 10 times. What I remember the most, though, was their travel to “the backside” of the Moon. Their signal would cut out. The first time it happened, no one knew if they would make it back into signal range. Or at least, no one—according to my memory of 56 years ago.

My parents always had the TV on. Always. If they were awake (and there was something on the air), the TV was on. Which meant I watched the Apollo 8 mission start to finish. It happened at Christmastime, and had this lovely moment (as recalled on NASA.gov):

On Christmas morning, mission control waited anxiously for word that Apollo 8’s engine burn to leave lunar orbit had worked. They soon got confirmation when Lovell radioed, “Roger, please be informed there is a Santa Claus.”

Yep. There was. Apollo 8 has appeared in my fiction a number of times, but never like it had in this story. I think the germ for Recovering Apollo 8 was born in that fear I experienced throughout the mission, that these men would be lost. They weren’t. In our world, all went well.

But in the world of Recovering Apollo 8, the worst happened. And provided the catalyst for other kinds of space travel.

This novella, highly acclaimed and award-winning, is one of the six novellas in the current Kickstarter, which ends tomorrow night. You can get it, five more novellas, and at least five more novelettes (maybe another, if we hit another stretch goal). Check it out here. To find out more about the writing of the other novellas, go here, here, here, and here. I’ll post one more tomorrow.

The two novellas, “The Break-In” and “The Death Hole Bunker,” are part, in very different form, of my novel The Ivory Trees, which is in the extended part of the Diving Universe. The novellas stand alone (clearly!).

The novelette, “The Nameless Dead,” is not part of any series and actually came from a rather disturbing dream I had. You’ll see why I say disturbing if you read the novelette…which I encourage you to do.

The kind folks at Asimov’s have reprinted every story on the ballot online for a short time only. That means if you click on this phrase, you will find 16 pieces of short fiction that are more than worth your time, as well as some wonderful science fiction poetry.

Oh, heck. Let me give you the link again. It’s https://www.asimovs.com/about-asimovs/readers-award-finalists/. This is not just free reading. It’s excellent free reading.

I’m in great company in these categories. Wonderful writers all, and marvelous stories.

Enjoy.

But TZ inspired him from a young age. When he started writing, he took Stephen King’s advice to writers, to write what you’re afraid of. And weirdly, Dean’s afraid of suburbs. (I’m not kidding. You should be with him in a car when we accidentally find ourselves in one. He needs to leave…fast.)

So he combined a love of the TZ eerie with a fear of suburbs to come up with Bryant Street. He’s written stories about this suburb as long as I’ve known him, and now he’s collecting them into books. As we’re doing at WMG with our new books, he’s offering those books first in a Kickstarter, along with some great rewards for readers and writers. (He also has a starter kit for his works, if you’ve never read Dean’s stuff before.)

The Kickstarter has just gone live, and it’s a short one–only 10 days. So hurry on over and see what I’m talking about.

Oh, and if you want to sample a free Bryant Street story to see if you would like them, click here.

First, we’re making a number of changes at WMG and on the websites and such. One of the most visible is the Publishers Blog, which will become something a lot more…shall we say, interesting? Instead of a list of what we’re publishing each week, there will be surprises and much more. Here’s the first, and it contains a fun gift. Head over to see what we’re doing and to get your gift.

Second, we have three in-person workshops in the next year. Two of which I’m teaching and one is the Anthology Workshop, which is being brought back by popular demand. We only have a few slots left in the Anthology Workshop, which will happen at Resorts World here in Las Vegas in mid-July. We only have three slots left in my Space Opera workshop next January. There are a few more slots available in the May Fantasy Detective workshops. Both of those will be at Resorts World as well. I hope some of you decide to attend. Here’s the information on the in-person workshops.

We also offer study-alongs with the craft workshops that I teach. (That would be Space Opera and Fantasy Detectives in the next year.) You don’t get about 50% of what I’m teaching, since there’s a lot of in-person interaction, but you get the lectures and assignments. Click here for more information.

Third, we’re offering our Bite-Size Copyright class at half off. That’s 52 short lessons on copyright. Writers, what you do when you market your fiction is license it…unless you don’t know what you’re doing and sell it outright. So this helps you learn the ins and outs of copyright, and also how to continue studying this changing area all on your own. Here’s more information on that.

I’m hoping to have more information for you on my fiction soon, as well as a new Recommended Reading List. Last week, life kinda nailed me, but I’m digging out, and hope to have these things for you soon.

Oh, and this post has a picture of Cheeps on it, just because.

Anyway, I want you to enjoy all of the holiday stories that I’ve loved these past years, which is why this list exists.

I love holiday stories of all kinds. I save up the stories to read during the season, and I find that I enjoy them more when I do this.

I also love to write holiday stories. I’ve published three collections of them under my Rusch name, and have a series of three novellas as Kristine Grayson.

I also edit something WMG Publishing calls The Holiday Spectacular. It officially starts on American Thanksgiving, which was yesterday, but you can subscribe until December 1. This year, you get 40 original stories, one per day, until New Year’s Day. We also have all of our holiday fiction stories and products at our brand-new holiday store. From my novels and stories to Dean’s novels and stories to the holiday products that we have just started connected to the Holiday Spectacular. Right now, everything is on sale, because, hey!, it’s Black Friday. So head on over and take a look.

This list below is a compilation of all of the stories I’ve recommended since I started posting the Recommended Reading List. The list is growing quite long, which pleases me. I have left the descriptions as they were in the original Recommended Reading list, so some of them mention that it’s not Christmas time or something else that’s going on while I was reading. Eh. Just go with it.

Not all of the stories are easily available any more. Last year, I tried to fix all of the links as well. Some had expired. But I’m keeping the listings here in case you want to search for them. I had a lot of fun revisiting the list this year. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed many of these stories. I suspect you’ll enjoy them as well.

Happy holiday reading!

HOLIDAY RECOMMENDED READING LIST

Allyn, Doug, “The Snow Angel,” Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, January, 2014. (Also in The Best American Mysteries 2015) Detective Dylan LaCrosse gets called to a crime scene outside a beautiful home. A dead girl, dressed as if she were going to prom, dies in the snow. She had waved her arms and legs before dying, and she looked like a perfect snow angel.

Somehow, Doug, who is one of our best writers, imho, manages to throw a novel’s worth of twists and turns into this fantastic story. I thought it might be simply a good Doug Allyn story (and you know you’re in the hands of a great writer when good is exactly what we expect, and we hope for more) until the last section. And that section made the story absolutely perfect. Read this one. It is a holiday crime story, but you can enjoy it year round.

Arnold, Jeremy, Christmas in the Movies, Running Press, 2018. This pretty little book provided a lot of entertainment for me in this dark year. I found some movies I hadn’t seen, so I watched them. I remembered ones I loved, and thought about watching them (which was enough). There were some delightful facts in here, and some lovely photos as well. And yes, that means I recommend you pick up the hardcover…

Baum, L. Frank, “A Kidnapped Santa Claus,” Short Stories For Christmas, Saland Publishing audiobook, 2013. I believe this story was read by Bart Wolffe, but I’m not certain, and the book listing doesn’t say which stories he read. The story itself was a revelation for me. Yes, this is L. Frank Baum, the man who wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and published it in 1900. I had no idea he wrote Santa stories, but he did, and this one, at least, is surprisingly modern. I mentioned it to Dean, and he had known about Baum’s Christmas stories. They were a surprise to me.

Some things aren’t the same, of course. Santa lives in the Laughing Valley, not the North Pole, and the elves and such are very different creatures than the ones we’re used to. But the sleigh, Santa’s midnight ride, all of that is quite modern. In this, Santa gets kidnapped on Christmas Eve and can’t make his ride. Very tense, and quite exciting. I have no idea how the story would be to read, but I found the audiobook marvelous, and worth recommending. I haven’t listened to all of the stories in the collection, but I plan to eventually.

Balogh, Mary, Someone To Trust, Jove, 2018. To be honest, I wasn’t ready to read anything at all romantic. I wanted murder and mayhem. But my favorite mystery writers disappointed me last month, so I picked up Balogh, whose work I adore.

I was worried as I started this one. It is part of a series that I’m greatly enjoying, but this book seemed very peripheral at first. The opening is set at Christmas, with a wedding from the previous book. I wouldn’t call this a holiday novel, though, although it is appropriate to read at the holidays.

Then the book switched up. Balogh usually doesn’t have villains in her novels. If someone is truly dastardly, they’re dastardly and dead. In fact, the effects of one horrible man launched this entire series. But this novel has a true villain. She’s a narcissist who showed up in previous novels, but not in a starring role. She is as believable as Balogh’s other characters, which is to say, very believable. Chilling. By the middle of the novel, I could not see how our protagonists were going to deal with her while keeping this a romance novel. (If it had been a mystery, she would have been a corpse or the murderer by the middle of the novel.)

Needless to say, Balogh pulled it off. I devoured the last part of this book, worried for our characters, and reassured, as romance novels do. A nice read for a dark time of year.

Baxter, John, Immoveable Feast: A Paris Christmas, Harper Perennial, 2008. A wonderful little erudite book about an ex-patriate Australian cooking Christmas dinner for his wife’s family in France. No pressure there.

This is beautifully written, with lots and lots and lots of great descriptions of setting and food and food and setting. Lots of history of certain customs and traditions. It even has a bit of suspense: will he get the piglet he wants for the centerpiece of the dinner, will it (or any piglet) fit in the oven in the old farmhouse, and will the family eat the finished product, made with “unusual” (read: Not French) spices? By the time I got to the piglet section, I actually cared about all of those things.

A lovely little Christmas book, and one that can be read outside of the holiday season, if you’re so inclined. The clash of cultures stuff is particularly nice.

Burton, Jaci, All She Wants For Christmas, Carina Press, 2010. I read this book at night while I was trying to read a graphically violent book. I didn’t want to read that book before bed, and this one—with a country music singer heroine—spoke to me, even though it’s not Christmas time. (I think it shows how desperate I was to get away from that book that I went not only to a romance, but a Christmas romance.)

This is the first book I’ve read by Burton. I liked it. It was heartwarming, just like it should have been. I ordered the other two books in the series the moment I finished it, which tells you she did well. In fact, she did so well, she’s the one who convinced me I didn’t need to torture myself with that other book any longer. So I didn’t. I’m reading romances again instead.

Burton, Mary, “Christmas Past,” anthology with Fern Michaels, JoAnn Ross, and Judy Duarte, Kensington Reissue 2017. I’ve clearly been in the mood for holiday mysteries and I was happy to find this one. I’d read half of this book two years ago, and finished it this year. This story is about a woman who fled (and survived) an abusive husband. He’s dead, but manages to torture her from the grave. (His plans are fiendish, and fascinating.) Well written and intriguing, this story made me look for more of her work. I wondered why I hadn’t bought any of it, since it all sounded like things I’d be interested in. And then I saw the covers. They were/are appropriate for the genre, but not to my taste. They actually sent me away from her books. I’ll see how the novels are, but this story is great. Perfect if you’re in a holiday mystery mood.

Cach, Lisa, “A Midnight Clear,” Mistletoe’d, Kindle Edition, 2011. A lovely holiday novella, set in New York at the end of the 19^th century. The period details are fun—I had no idea that was when the Christmas card habit started—and the characters are great. Catherine has spent years being wined and dined by her rich aunt, going to London, Paris, and on what was once called the Grand Tour. Catherine has met European royalty and American royalty. She wears fine clothes, and she has an eye for beauty. Sort of. Because Catherine is terribly near-sighted and too vain to wear glasses.

She comes home for Christmas, to her family’s not insubstantial house in a relatively small town, and one of her wealthy suitors follows her. But she also meets a man whom she has no idea is wealthy—William, the owner of the general store. She’s not attracted to him at first because she can’t see him, literally. Then someone (William?) buys her a pair of spectacles and has them anonymously delivered, and suddenly she can see everything much clearer.

A great deal more happens here, including a magical wish by an innocent young girl (is that where the spectacles come from?), and some proper comeuppance for a very bad person. The story is lovely, the details good, and all of it will put you in a wonderful holiday mood. Enjoy!

Cach, Lisa, “Puddings, Pastries, and Thou,” Wish List, Leisure, 2003 (also in Mistletoe’d). I have no idea where I got this anthology, which also features Lisa Kleypas, Claudia Dain, and Lynsay Sands, but I read it for two reasons: First, I’m still puttering through my Kleypas binge, and second, I always read a Christmas romance anthology over the holidays.

I have to say, though, that I really hated the design of this book. It doesn’t do what romance anthologies (heck, all anthologies) should, which is point you to the authors’ other work. In fact, the stories themselves have no byline. You have to look at the table of contents to see who wrote what.

The Cach story was a nice surprise. I’ve probably read two dozen such anthologies over the years and the stories are often sweet but predictable. This one wasn’t predictable. I’ve discovered Mary Balogh through such an anthology, and now I’ll seek out other work by Cach.

This is a witty story of a down-and-out woman whose immediate family was dead and who depends on the kindness of her distant relations. Only they stuck her with an elderly woman who had either dementia or Alzeheimers (of course, the story doesn’t say since it’s set in Regency England). She was the 24/7 caretaker, and she barely had time for herself. She also barely got enough to eat.

When the story begins, our heroine Vivian has just moved in with another set of distant relatives, and must contend with a jealous 17-year-old who is about to debut. I’m all set for a Mean Girls story—the 17-year-old doesn’t want to share her glory days with a lesser cousin—but the story doesn’t work that way.

The 17-year-old does set Vivian up with a seemingly undesirably hero, who is a bad influence not because he’s a rake or an alcoholic, but because…well, let me simply say that it has to do with morals that no longer exist. He had done something honorable in our world, but dishonorable in theirs.

The entire story centers around the feasts over the holiday, and Cach delineates them with loving care. It’s pretty clear that Vivian will go from being a bony distant relation to a fat lord’s wife, and we’re cheering for her the whole way.

And the story made me hungry for pastries. Enough said.

Cantrell, Rebecca, “Twinkle (A Joe Tesla Christmas), Yultide Thrills: A Christmas Anthology, 2023. I had a moment as I read this story. I love Rebecca Cantrell’s work, but she often violates my reader rules. I decided life’s too short to read about children or pets in jeopardy (and yes, I know. I’m a hypocrite. I put children and pets in jeopardy in my work). But for relaxation, I try to avoid those things. Rebecca has no qualms about threatening every living creature in one of her books, and sometimes she carries through with those threats. Writers, that adds to stakes.

So I started her collection of Christmas stories. I can relate to the introduction, but in it, she says the stories get progressively darker. Now realize I have not yet read her Joe Tesla novels. So I had no idea how those stories work. And what should happen right off the bat? A little girl appears with a kitten in her pocket. Now, if this were the Hannah Vogel series, I’d be super worried. Okay, I was super worried anyway. So I peeked at the ending, saw that I could tolerate it, and went back and read the entire heartwarming and remarkable tale. I loved it.

It was the only holiday story I read this year. The season, as I said above, got away from me. I didn’t even get to finish the collection. But I will. It’s on my next-year holiday pile. And I may even sneak it in earlier.

Davis, Sam, “A Christmas Carol: Nevada Style,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. The Christmas in Nevada book starts with a short story written around 1870 or so, and tinkered with a few times. Cafferata says the version here is the original version (complete with some 19th century language). The story is about a saloon, looking for a piano player. A mysterious one shows up on Christmas. The story reminds me of Twain, and certainly shows how much he was influenced by his time here. The ending made me laugh out loud.

Dermatis, Dayle A., “Desperate Housewitches,” Uncollected Anthology: Winter Witches, Soul’s Road Press, 2014. I’m behind on some of my Uncollected Anthology reading from the previous group (including Dayle’s story), but I couldn’t pass this one up, just based on the title.

Trust Dayle to write a winter holiday story about the solstice and magic. She manages to combine the claustrophobia of a suburban neighborhood with the competitiveness that women sometimes engage in with holiday ritual. Only the holiday ritual here isn’t decorating a Christmas tree or singing carols (although there is a discussion of carolers that made me chuckle). Nope. This one is about pagan rituals. The story’s wonderful, funny, and a do-not-miss.

Dubé, Marcelle, McKell’s Christmas, Falcon Ridge Publishing, Kindle edition. 2013. McKell, a cop in Manitoba, finally gets a Christmas Eve off. He has dinner with his girlfriend’s friends. One friend brings a new boyfriend, and tensions rise—just not in the way you’d expect. The Canadian setting is real, the mystery is fascinating, and the characters excellent. Pick this one up.

Dubé, Marcelle, Running Away From Christmas, Falcon Ridge Publishing, Kindle edition, 2012. I read this one after the holiday because I simply couldn’t wait until next year. Faith can’t take another Christmas alone, so she runs away to Vancouver B.C., where…well, I’d like to say the holiday stalks her, but it’s not quite like that. It’s sweeter. A wonderful story, no matter the time of year.

Fry, Hannah and Evans, Thomas Oléron, The Indisputable Existence of Santa Claus: The Mathematics of Christmas, The Overlook Press, 2016. A dense but fun little book that uses math to prove all kinds of things like Santa exists. Maybe. Kinda. Not in the way you’d expect. And how to wrap gifts properly. and how to divide dessert, and win at Monopoly, and many other fun things associated with the holidays. The book is pretty too, so I’d suggest the tiny hardcover edition.

Green, John, “A Cheertastic Christmas Miracle,” Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. Okay, I get it now. This is the first story I’ve read of megaseller John Green’s, and it’s a lot of fun. This is one of three linked holiday romances in the Let It Snow volume, and is perhaps the liveliest one.

Set in the middle of a Christmas blizzard, three friends get called by another friend to get to the Waffle House ASAP because a trainload of cheerleaders (literally) are stranded there. The adventure is the journey to the Waffle House, and all the character arcs, etc., punctuated by reports from the Waffle House itself. Extremely fun, extremely memorable story.

Hallinan, Timothy, “Chalee’s Nativity,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. Amazing story about two orphans on the streets of Bangkok. Apparently, Chalee has appeared in Hallinan’s work before. Well written, heartbreaking in a good way. Worth the price of admission.

Herron, Mick, “The Usual Santas,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. The title story of this wonderful collection is a title story for a reason. A group of Santas working at a disreputable mall discover a problem among them. When Dean and I teach, we talk about writer stages—Stage One Writers are learning grammar, etc. Stage Four writers have learned their craft and have added some tools to the bargain. Stage Four Writers break lots of rules because they know how.

Herron is Stage Four, and this story shows why. With the exception of one minor character named Joe, everyone else in the story is named Santa. And they have dialogue with each other attributed to Santa. And it all works beautifully. I love this story. I wish I had written this story. I wish I could read it for the first time all over again. Wonderful and worth the price of admission.

Hockensmith, Steve, “Fruitcake,” Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. I love Steve Hockensmith’s short stories, partly because they’re so memorable. I couldn’t get fruitcake out of my mind for days—much as I wanted to. I’m not fond of fruitcake. Many others aren’t either which is the impetus for this story of regifting and murder.

Hockensmith, Steve “Naughty,” Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. Funny story about a down-on-her-luck woman, Christmas “elves,” a department store, and a rather unexpected crime. Fun and memorable.

Hockensmith, Steve, Naughty: Nine Tales of Christmas Crime, Kindle edition, 2010. I have no idea how many of Steve Hockensmith’s short stories I’ve read in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine or in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine over the years. Quite a few, judging by the ones I remembered and reread in this collection. It’s a collection of Steve’s Christmas stories, all of which I liked, many of which I loved. Even the copyright page is funny. My only quibble with the volume? In it, Steve mentions he’s too busy to write short fiction these days. So I say, Stop sleeping, Steve! Write your books, but write short stories too. Whatever it takes. Maybe it takes y’all to buy this book to get him to write more short stories. So do it.

Hunter, Madeline, “A Christmas Abduction,” Seduction on a Snowy Evening, Kensington Books, 2019. This comes from another of those anthologies that weirdly does not give the editor credit. Oh, I hate that.

The anthology has three novellas, along with excerpts from upcoming novels, which I mostly skipped. I bought the anthology because of a different author, but this is the story that I found memorable. I’d heard a lot about Madeline Hunter, but I’ve never read her work before (that I remember). She managed to set up a heartbreaking scenario for our heroine, one that our hero understands without her telling him about it, because he already knew bits and pieces of the story. He just put it all together for her.

Novellas a tricky, particularly a romance novella with villains, which this one has. Hunter pulled off the villain in a way that I had expected only because I’m a writer, and because I realized about 20 pages from the end there’s only one person who could be the villain. But she did the work delicately and in a delightful manner.

If you like holiday novellas, you’ll like this one. It’s like no other that I’ve read.

James, P.D., The Mistletoe Murder And Other Stories, Knopf, 2016. This tiny little book pleased me in a thousand ways, and made me sad. First, the pleasing part(s): the stories, the design, the way it felt in my hands. I loved the attention to detail here.

The part that made me sad? P.D. James died in 2014, and will not be writing any new books. I suspect the estate might approve more things like this, and I’ll read it all, but it won’t be the same. After I finished this, I thought that I might reread some of her books. Can’t decide if I will or not. I remember them so vividly…

My one complaint with the volume is that there is no copyright page that lists where the stories were first published. I love that kind of information and am sad to see that Knopf left it out.

Anyway, this volume is wonderful and worth reading. I’m going to highlight a couple of the stories that I loved below. Surprisingly, to me anyway, the stories without her usual main character Adam Dalgliesh were the ones I preferred. Maybe because those were atypical cozies. I dunno.

James, P.D., “The Mistletoe Murder,” The Mistletoe Murder And Other Stories, Knopf, 2016. The title story of this collection is the title story for a reason. This is a very strong mystery, filled with honest misdirection (meaning it was all there in plain sight, but still hard to see) and great characters. A long-time mystery writer reflects on a strange family Christmas she attended in 1940. I love the discussion of mysteries versus real life murders, and all kinds of tiny details. If I say much more, I’ll ruin it.

James, P.D., Sleep No More, , Knopf, 2017. I have no idea who is handling P.D. James’s estate, but kudos to whomever is. This is the second year that the estate has released a group of previously uncollected short stories in a beautiful edition just in time for the holiday season. None of the stories struck me as spectacular James, but regular James is still better than most writers out there. The opening story, “The Yo-Yo,” stopped me right at the beginning and made me check when it was first published. Not because it was dated, but because the observation at the beginning—that a simple item, found after death, might seem to have sentimental value, and that value might be completely misconstrued. That’s an observation someone older has, not someone young. And sure enough, she wrote that story in her 70s. Some of the stories here are Christmas stories, a few are not. All are worth reading.

Johnson, Craig, “In The Land of The Blind,” The Best American Mystery Stories 2017, edited by John Sanford, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017. I haven’t read any of Johnson’s Longmire series, until I read this short story. A short holiday tale without the usual holiday sappiness. In fact, a drug addict takes some people hostage in a church on Christmas Eve. The way that the hostage situation gets resolved is one of the most logical things I’ve seen. Well done.

Johnson, Maureen, “The Jubilee Express,” Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. Jubilee’s parents get arrested in a brawl at a collectibles store the day before Christmas, so they send her to spend the holiday with her grandparents. She has to take a train, which stalls in the middle of a blizzard in a small town. She doesn’t want to sit in the cold train for hours (and maybe days) so she hikes in the snow to the Waffle House, followed by a gaggle of cheerleaders. I thought I had the story figured out twice, and I was wrong both times. Loads and loads of fun, with great characters and lots of heart.

Kaaberbøl, Lene, and Friis, Agnete, “When The Time Came,” translated by Mark Kline, The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. A dark and brooding story featuring the duo’s main character, Nina Borg. Thieves break into what they believe to be an empty building during the holidays, only to discover someone in extreme distress. If I say much more I ruin it. But suffice to say I had no idea how this would end up, and loved the way that it resolved.

Klavan, Andrew, “The Advent Reunion,”Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, January, 2011. A Christmas ghost story that packs a heck of a punch. Very short, very powerful. If I say any more, I’ll ruin it.

Kleypas, Lisa, Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor, St. Martin’s Paperback, 2011. I saved this one for my holiday reading. In fact, I bought it in October when it first came out—and honestly, I could’ve read it then, despite the title. Because this isn’t a Christmas story; it’s a fall holidays story. Halloween makes a major appearance and Thanksgiving is hilarious, even though the book itself isn’t funny, but heartwarming.

Holly’s mother died in April, leaving Holly’s uncle Mark as her guardian. Mark has never been around children, doesn’t know what to do, but he enlists his brother Sam, and together they try to make a home for this poor little girl who has given up speaking since her mother’s sudden death. Six months later—in September—Holly writes a letter to Santa: she wants a mom for Christmas. Not that Mark wants to marry or anything. You get the rest of the plot, of course.

But the book is set on the San Juan Islands in Washington State, and it’s clear that Kleypas lives in the Northwest because the details are great. The characters are even better, from Holly to Mark to Maggie, the young widow who has just started a toy store. Realistic, sensitive, and touching. You can read this one at any season of the year (but fall would be best).

Kroupa, Susan, “Walter’s Christmas-Night Musik,” Laurel Fork Press, Kindle Edition, 2010. A wonderful story about Christmas Night visitors. Unlike the previous Christmas night visitor stories you’ve read, these visitors are a surprise. I’d like to be visited by these folks. I found myself thinking about this story long after I finished reading it.

Let It Snow, Speak, 2009. I normally label books by author, but I have no idea how to label this one, because it’s listed in three different ways on the three different websites I went to. So I gave up and did this.

Let It Snow is a series of linked holiday romances written for young adults, but really, who cares who the target market is? The stories work. All three of them are good, but the first two are so good that I found myself a bit disappointed with the third. Had I read it as a standalone, I probably would have loved it.

The sense of teenagers at loose ends on the night before Christmas in a blizzard comes through all of the stories. The romances are believable, the stories powerful, and the settings wonderfully done. If you need some holiday reading, pick up this book.

Levine, Laura, “The Dangers of Candy Canes,” Candy Cane Murder, Kensington, 2007. I love Laura Levine’s voice. I wasn’t in the mood for saccharine stories in 2020, and while this story is a cozy, the voice takes it out of the sweetly simpering. I started the story on Christmas Eve Day at breakfast and tore through the entire thing, often chuckling out loud.

Levine, Laura, “Nightmare on Elf Street,” Secret Santa, Zebra, 2013. The voice in this piece caught me from the very beginning. In fact, I read it before I read anything else in the volume and, as a stickler for reading anthologies in order, that’s truly saying something.

A freelance ad writer thinks she’s going to get an advertising account; instead, through mishaps, she gets hired as a Santa’s Elf at Toyland. She doesn’t correct the mistake because she needs the money. The story’s a typical cozy—a rather bloodless (deserved) murder, lots of suspects, and a goodly amount of humor.

I laughed, fell in love with the cat, and enjoyed the situation. I’ll be looking for Levine’s other books, which is exactly what novellas like this should make me do.

Lovesey, Peter, “The Haunted Crescent,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. A delightful Christmas ghost story with a twist that I never saw coming. I shall say no more, except to remind you to go and read this one.

Lyons, Kay, The Crash Before Christmas, Kindred Spirits Publishing, Kindle edition, 2011. A delightful Christmas romance. I figured out what was going on at the end of chapter three, but most readers won’t. This novel, about a bush pilot who crashes in a blizzard and is rescued by a mysterious woman, is occasionally creepy, and very suspenseful. It’s a great holiday read; I suspect you’ll enjoy it year-round.

Macomber, Debbie, Twelve Days of Christmas, Ballantine Books, 2017. I have no idea how I’ve never read a Debbie Macomber book before. I’m not even sure I’ve read one of her Christmas books, and she’s the queen of Christmas romance. I have a hunch I thought I wouldn’t like the novels, because they’d be overly religious and dealing with people I didn’t want to read about.

This one caught my eye in the grocery store, of all places. I read the back cover blurb, and immediately picked up the book. Julia has troubles with her grumpy (and gorgeous) neighbor. She decides to kill him with kindness and blog about it for twelve days. Of course, this is fraught with issues. The blog’s witty, the characters are real, the situation is uncomfortable. I read the book in an evening, and found the novel charming. I’m not going to run out and buy all the back Christmas books of Debbie’s, but I’ll read a few when I find them. This was a lovely way to start my holiday season. The book is worth your time.

MacDonald, John D., “Dead on Christmas Street,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime, 2013. This story, first published in 1952, feels surprisingly contemporary. A woman dives out of a seventeen-story window. The death gets investigated, of course. The forensic details are accurate for the time, and the entire attitude expressed here feels like something someone could have written now. MacDonald was/is a master, and stories like this prove why.

McBain, Ed, “All Through The House,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime, 2013. This is an 87th Precinct story of McBain’s that I hadn’t read before. It’s Christmas Eve, and Carella is alone in the precinct. People continue to show up, seemingly re-enacting the Nativity. But it’s McBain, so emphasis on “seemingly.” I loved this story. You will too.

McPherson, Catriona, “Mrs. Tilling’s Match,” Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, November/December, 2020. “Mrs. Tilling’s Match” is part of the Dandy series that McPherson writes. I’ve never read the series, but this story stood alone just fine. (I have a hunch I might have missed a thing or two, but still…) The story is set at Christmas 1934, and deals with a note that the cook of the family receives. It’s emotional and creepy, in a good way, and the tension was quite surprising. Looks like I’ll have to investigate some of her books.

Morgan, Sarah, Miracle on 5th Avenue, HQN, 2016. Eva’s upbeat grandmother taught her to be the sunshine in every dark room. So when her grandmother dies, Eva doesn’t know how to grieve. She’s going to spend the holidays house-sitting (and decorating) a penthouse apartment on 5th Avenue.

Said apartment belongs to Lucas, a thriller writer, whose wife died suddenly. Lucas hasn’t told anyone that he failed to take the scheduled trip out of town, so when Eva shows up–in the middle of a blizzard, natch–she encounters the Big Bad Crime Writer.

Funny, wry, charming, with tons of insights about writing and the perils of falling for a writer. Don’t know how I missed Sarah Morgan, but I have a lot of reading to catch up on.

Nordeen, Juliet, New Year’s Shenanigans, 2019. The first full length book in the Modesta Quinn series finds our heroine investigating a break-in at a legal pot-growing facility in the rainy New Year up in Washington State. Modesta Quinn made her first appearance in our Holiday Spectacular, solving a crime around Christmas. I loved that story, and had high hopes for the novel. It more than lived up to my expectations. Lots of great procedures, marvelous descriptions, a good plot with some surprising twists, and excellent characters. I hope Juliet continues with this series, because I’ll continue to read it.

Page, Norvell, “Crime’s Christmas Carol,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. I’m sure Dean had heard of Norvell Page, but I never had. Page was a prolific writer for the pulps in the 1930s. This story was first published in 1939, and was a riff on O Henry’s “Gift of the Magi,” only with a heck of a criminal twist. Yet somehow Page managed to pull off a happy ending. The story becomes more poignant when you remember that it was written and published during the Depression.

Patterson, Irette Y., “Worth,” Saturday Evening Post, December 19, 2014. A lovely short Christmas piece by Irette. I read it on Christmas Eve, and it really added to an already special day. A short story about money, holidays, and love. This one’s good any time of year.

Patterson, Kent, “The Wereyam,” A Fantastic Holiday Season, edited by Kevin J. Anderson, WordFire Press, 2013. Kevin put together a holiday anthology of the stories that the writers who used to gather for our Christmas holiday parties wrote and read to each other for those gatherings. Kent’s “The Wereyam” is one of my favorites, so when the book arrived, I sat down and reread this story immediately. It not only holds up, it’s better than I remember.

We lost Kent in 1995, and while it was hard on all of us personally, I think of the loss to writing, and I mourn. He was just getting started in what would have been a fantastic career, and he died suddenly. I’m so glad that this story has been reprinted. Take a look. See if you don’t love it too.

Penzler, Otto, The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. It took me four holiday seasons to finish this book, not because it was a slog to read, but because there were so many stories. And they were mostly to my taste. I think I skipped maybe three of them completely. The book is nearly 700 pages long, and the pages are in columns, so it probably would have been 1400 to 1500 pages long if the design was different.

Usually I complain about how the best American series is laid out, and Otto is the series editor for the mystery volume. But he has no say in the editorial layout: that’s clearly mandated by the publisher. All of Otto’s other anthologies have narrative flow.

This one has a great editorial conceit. The book is divided into sections. For example, the book starts with the section “A Cozy Little Christmas” and ends with “A Classic Little Christmas.” As is appropriate for a book that covers the entire genre, the book starts with an Agatha Christie story (Peroit) and ends with another (Marple). In the middle of the book there are a wide variety of other sections, from “A Scary Little Christmas” to “A Modern Little Christmas.” My tastes veer away from cozy and classic, so my favorite parts of the book were in the middle.

I was disappointed to come to the end of the book. I had been at reading it for so long that it had become a holiday tradition for me. Unfortunately, I have a great memory for stories, and I rarely read any twice. Otherwise, I would start all over again next year. Great volume. Lots of fun. Pick it up.

Peters, Ellis, “The Trinity Cat,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. This particular story, originally published in 1976, the story is about a real cat acting in a real cat way. Set on Christmas Eve in a small English village, the story features an older woman’s murder, a tight cast of characters, and some wry observations. It’s a cozy, but not a light or funny one. I enjoyed it a great deal.

Reed, Annie, “The Case of the Missing Elf,” Thunder Valley Press, Kindle Edition, 2010. One of the nice things about the revolution in e-publishing is that you can buy a single short story of an author’s work just as a sample. I already knew that I liked Annie Reed’s stories, but I also know she’s not a household name. I hope that changes.

This is one of her Dee and Diz fantasy detective stories. Diz is an elf, although not a traditional one, and Dee is a woman with an added gift. There’s a bit of romantic tension involved, but that’s not at the heart of this story. Like so many stories on this month’s list, this is a Christmas tale. And the missing elf is not the Jolly Old One, but his occasional impersonator, Norman. Fun, and thought-provoking, in a Christmasy kinda way. It’s a nice introduction to Annie’s work.

Reed, Annie, “Essy and The Christmas Kitten,” Kindle edition, Thunder Valley Press, 2011. This story is not as sweet as the title implies. Instead, it is a bit dark and moody, so much so that I read with one eye half closed, worried that something would go wrong. But it is a Christmas story in the best way, and quite memorable. One of my best Christmas reads this year.

Reed, Annie, “Roger’s Christmas Wish,” Kindle Edition, Thunder Valley Press, 2010. Somehow I missed this in last year’s Christmas reading. Young Roger’s grandmother moved in with him, taking his room. His parents are unhappy, and so is Roger. All he wants for Santa to do is make his grandmother leave. The story is sweet, with unexpected twists. It’s also a nicely done e-book. I read it in the Kindle app on my iPad and it felt like I was reading a real book. Nicely done.

Reed, Annie, The New Year That Almost Wasn’t, A Diz & Dee Mystery, Thunder Valley Press, 2013. I love Diz & Dee so much that I bought one of the stories for Fiction River: Unnatural Worlds. So, imagine my surprise when I discovered that about a year ago, Annie had written one and I had missed it! I ordered it immediately, read it immediately, and enjoyed immensely.

The woman pregnant with the New Year’s baby goes missing. Not the first baby born in the year, but the baby who will become the ancient guy by December 31. Great concept, and it becomes even greater when we find out what happens to the ancient guy when his job is done. I’m not going to spoil it. Read this one.

Ross, Barbara, “Logged On,” Yule Log Murder, anthology with Leslie Meier, and Lee Hollis, Kensington, 2018. Surprisingly tense story about baking, of all things. Julia Snowden wants to make a french dessert called Bûche de Noël, but she can’t pull it off. Then her mother reminds her that an elderly neighbor used to make it for Christmases past, and it was good. Thing is, as Julia learns to bake with her neighbor, she also learns that a lot of people the neighbor knows have died of gastric issues around the holidays. Is the cranky elderly woman a serial poisoner? Or is something else going on?

I did not see the ending coming, which is lovely and surprising and fun for me. And the writing is excellent, and just thinking about the story makes me hungry. One of my favorite reads of December.

Ross, Dalton & Snierson, Dan, “Let’s Make A Christmas Movie! (Or Not)” Entertainment Weekly, December, 2021. This article is for everyone who has watched one of the roughly 150 Christmas movies that come out on Lifetime, Hallmark, Netflix and other channels, and thought, “I can do that!” EW “tasked” (their word) to write and pitch a holiday movie, which they did. Their experiences should be a lesson to all of you who want a career writing screenplays. Make sure you have a strong backbone and can take criticism. And stuff your know-it-all side into a closet somewhere. Really worth reading, for writers and non-writers alike.

Ross, JoAnn, “Dear Santa,” Silver Bells anthology with Fern Michaels, Mary Burton, and Judy Duarte, Kensington Reissue 2017. I found this volume in a discount store. Originally, the book came out in 2008, but apparently, it’s been reissued. I was getting pretty burned out on Christmas stories by the time I picked this up. The only reason I started JoAnn’s story is because I like her work and because it was about a mystery writer. The writer’s name is Holly Berry, and there’s an actual reason for that. Not a funny reason. A sad and heartwarming one.

Anyway, Holly gets caught in a snow storm in the mountains and sees a reindeer cross her path (Blitzen?). Then she crashes her SUV. Of course, she’s rescued by a hunk of a man who also happens to have the world’s cutest daughter. He’s mayor of the most Christmassy town in the United States, and owns an inn. And in the context of the story, all of this is believable. And wonderful. And charming.

And…and…I cried at the end. Not a delicate little tear running down the side of my face, no. A gasp-y sobby kind of crying that only a few authors have achieved for me in the past—at least with something sweet. So pick up a copy of this book. The paperback is super cheap right now, so if you prefer that format, it’s cheaper than the ebook.

Runyon, Damon, “Dancing Dan’s Christmas,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. Every time I read a Damon Runyon story, I realize how much I enjoy his work. I just never seem to seek him out. I’m not sure why. I loved this one as well. First published in Collier’s in 1932, this story is firmly set in its era. It begins in a speakeasy, involves a drunken pact, and…works. Somehow. I loved it.

Seabrook, John, Jingle Bell Pop, Narrated by Erin Moon, Audible Studios, 2018. I don’t recommend audiobooks often, because I spend half my listening time on podcasts. But a friend recommended this, and I do have an Audible membership, so I downloaded it.

Jingle Bell Pop was one of the free selections for December 2018. I assume it’ll still be available after that.

It’s a behind-the-scenes of the business of Christmas carols. I knew a lot of the stories, but the modern ones, I did not know. The author interviewed songwriters, and calls Christmas pop hits “an annuity.” Yep. If the contracts were good, the writers earned and earned and still earn. Writers should listen to this one, just to see how copyright can be your friend. The book is an hour and 14 minutes long. Well worth listening to.

Shalvis, Jill, “Bah, Handsome!” Merry and Bright, Kensington, 2019. An early Jill Shalvis holiday novella that has most of what I love about her writing. (Not enough goofy animals, though.) Hope runs a B&B, and the lawyer for her mean-as-sin brother who loaned her money arrives to collect. In the middle of a snowstorm. During the holidays. Yes, yes, you know how it will end, but there sure is a lot of tension and how-will-this-resolve? in the journey. Lots of fun.

Shalvis, Jill, Hot Winter Nights, Avon, 2018. I really have no idea how Shalvis makes her characters so winning, but she does. Molly Malone, the office manager for other characters in this series, wants to take an active part in investigations. Everyone else tries to thwart her. But she has two elderly elves who claim that something’s fishy at Santa’s Village, and she’s going to investigate. Lucas Knight doesn’t want her to, but knowing she won’t stop, he decides to help.

Some of the scenes in here are laugh-out-loud funny, especially as the elderly elves speak their minds. But there’s a lot of tension too, when it becomes clear that those elves were on to something. One of the most fun things I read all month.

Shalvis, Jill, The Trouble With Mistletoe, Avon, 2016. I bought this book last year and pulled it off my TBR shelf this year, after finishing something particularly bad and particularly dark. The book was the perfect antidote to that awful, dark novel. Shalvis has an incredible voice, and she creates spectacular characters, including the four-footed ones.

Willa owns South Bark, a pet shop that specializes in grooming and pet care. She’s covered in “puppies and poo” when who should walk in but Keane, the guy who stood her up on the only date she tried to have in high school. To make matters worse, he doesn’t remember her. His great-aunt dumped her tempermental cat on him because the aunt was having a health crisis and had no one else to turn to. He needs to board the cat, at least while he’s at work, because the cat—named Petunia by the aunt, rechristened PITA by Keane (Pain in the ass)—tends to show her displeasure by ruining anything she touches when she’s alone.

The meet-cute is so cute, I read it to Dean. Beneath the fun plot are serious issues, from abandonment to loveless middle class households to building your own family. I was halfway done with the book when I ordered the rest in the Heartbreaker Bay series. I had to refrain from ordering everything she wrote, because she’s written a lot. I’ve already worked my way through this book and a novella (which is fun and too slight to recommend), and I’m starting into another tonight. So, yeah. Read this. Everyone is great. Including PITA.

Smith, Dean Wesley, “Jukebox Gifts,” WMG Publishing, Kindle edition, 2010. I love Dean’s jukebox stories. The conceit is this: for the duration of a single song, played on a jukebox, the person who chose the story can time travel to their strongest memory of that song—and maybe change the past. “Jukebox Gifts” is set at Christmas and is both heartwarming and heartwrenching.

Tursten, Helen, “An Elderly Lady Seeks Peace at Christmastime,” translated by Marlaine Delargy,” The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. Delightful story about a regular character of Tursten’s named Maud. Maud is an octogenarian who uses people’s prejudices to change the world around her. She just wants a quiet Christmas, and she’ll resort to anything to get it. I’m definitely looking for more of Tursten’s work (preferably translated by Delargy, who found a perfectly wry voice for Maud).

Unknown, “Josephine and The Scary Santa: A Jarbridge Christmas,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. While I love the Christmas in Nevada book, it’s also deeply irritating. I have no idea when or where some of these pieces came from, nor do I know who wrote them. It’s clear, from the different voices, that Cafferata did not write most of the summaries. They might be from newspapers, but which ones and when is pretty unclear, even from the introductions.

This particular true story is about how little Josephine Cooper and her family spent one Christmas in Jarbridge in the early 1920s. Very short, and very delightful.

Unknown, “The Richest Christmas: Snowbound on the Swallow Ranch,” Christmas in Nevada, edited by Patricia D. Cafferata, University of Nevada Press, 2014. This particular incident happened in 1923. Five-year-old Sheldon Olds lived on the ranch with his father, who worked there. A blizzard came in at Christmas time and no one could leave to celebrate, so the Swallows held a celebration for everyone stuck on the ranch.

Sheldon was particularly terrified because he and one of the Swallow children had actually set fire to some straw in the barn about a month before. They had to hide in the sheep dip to avoid punishment. This story is about the repercussions during his meeting with Santa. Charming little piece.

The Usual Santas, no editor listed, Soho Crime, 2017. I loved this book and gave it to a number of Christmas-story loving friends. It’s beautifully designed, with lots of great extras inside. Visual extras. And there’s no editor listed, which pisses me off because clearly, someone edited this book, and put a lot of thought into it. The someone divided the stories by type (“acts of kindness”; “the darkest of holiday noir”) and put together a pleasing order of wonderful authors. This is a spectacular little book, worth every moment you spend with it.

Westlake, Donald, “The Burglar and The Whatsis,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, edited by Otto Penzler, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 2013. First published in Playboy in 1966, this story is as much sf as it is mystery. If I say much more about the story, I’ll spoil it. It’s very short, it has a couple of twists, and it made me laugh. In fact, it’s my favorite story in the volume so far (which isn’t saying a great deal, since I only managed about 100 pages of this massive tome before I stopped to save the rest for next holiday season).

Westlake, Donald, “Give Till It Hurts” Christmas at The Mysterious Bookshop, edited by Otto Penzler, Vangard Press, 2010. Losing Westlake was a tragedy. I love his Dortmunder stories and this one, written for the customers of Otto Penzler’s Mysterious Bookshop, is marvelous. Laugh out loud funny, as most Dortmunder stories are.

White, Ethel Lina, “Waxworks,” The Big Book of Christmas Mysteries, Vintage Crime, 2013. Ethel Lina White wrote seventeen novels, two of which became classic films, The Lady Vanishes and The Spiral Staircase. I hadn’t heard of her until I encountered this story, but it soon became clear why Hitchcock felt her to be a kindred spirit.

Sonia, a young reporter, has decided to make her reputation by spending New Year’s Eve in the Waxworks, ostensibly to catch the haunt or whatever it is that was causing all the spooky noises. She describes herself as “not timid” and “fairly perceptive” and believes she can solve this mystery.

Only things get a little more mysterious as time goes on. Someone dies, and some really spooky occurrences happen, and Sonia…well, read this. You’ll soon forget, as I did, that it was written in 1930. I actually pictured a waxworks I’d been to recently as I read it. Probably the most memorable story of the volume for me so far.

Willis, Connie, “All About Emily,” Asimov’s, December, 2011. (Also in A Lot Like Christmas) For years, Connie Willis’s holiday stories, published in Asimov’s, were part of my Christmas traditions. Then, she got deeply involved in her excellent novels, All Clear and Blackout (which I recommended earlier), and she stopped writing any short fiction at all. Which is, I think, a crime. I love Connie’s novels, but I adore her short work.

“All About Emily” riffs on the movie All About Eve, and explains the film for those of you who missed that marvelous classic. The story is set in New York at Christmas, and our heroine is the aging actress who might be threatened by a new up-and-comer, Emily. And yet, something about that girl….

It’s a fun story, especially if you love old movies, Broadway, theater, and New York at Christmas time. And it manages to be good science fiction as well. It’s nice to have you back, Connie. Please continue writing short fiction while doing your novels.

Willis, Connie, “Take A Look At The Five And Ten,” Asimov’s Science Fiction, November/December, 2020. The arrival of a new Connie Willis tale is always great news. This is one of her holiday novellas. It’s good, but not great, Willis. Good Willis is still five times better than what anyone else is doing. Well worth your time. I have included a link to the Subterranean edition, which looks pretty.

Yi, Melissa,“Blue Christmas,” Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, January/February, 2019. Melissa Yi, a doctor, writes a good series about Hope Sze, also a doctor. In this story, Hope goes to Christmas party, and observes things the rest of us never would. Lots of misdirection here, very well done, and some marvelous character building, with a lot of tension. And the meaning of blue…well, you’ll see.

A week ago Sunday, Dean tripped during a 5K run. He was going very fast, passing people and enjoying himself, when his toe caught on a concrete rise and down he went. Fortunately, as a former professional athlete, he knows how to fall. So he rolled and caught the impact of his entire body on his shoulder. I say fortunately, because judging where the bruises were—knees, hands, elbows, face—if he had fallen forward, like most people, he would have had several broken bones…or a crushed skull.

His shoulder, however, was ruined. Completely shattered. It took until Thursday to get him into surgery (after an emergency trip to the ER (Sunday), specialists (Tuesday), and pre-admittance hospital procedures (Wednesday)). In his entire charmed life, Dean has never broken a bone or had surgery, so all of this was new. And all of the professionals were worried about his reaction to anesthesia, since he’d never been under before.

He came through with flying colors (although “flying” is probably not a word I should use right now). He went into the hospital overnight and was released late on Friday. He’s here at home, recovering, with several weeks ahead of PT and with the use of only one arm.

My week’s plans went from finishing a novel, starting a novella, writing a blog, doing audio, and taking two quizzes in my classes, to making sure Dean was as comfortable as possible, wrangling medical documents, making medical professionals hear me when I said, “He’s in too much pain to wait for 10 days for surgery,” and figuring out various medical testing schedules. His excellent surgeon arranged a surgery in less than 2 days, and now Dean–while in pain–isn’t in excruciating pain. As of today, Monday, he’s up and about (until he needs sleep), and is getting things done albeit slowly.

Of course, the photo I attached to this post shows the real crisis in the household. Balloons! Apparently my cat Gavin believes that balloons are the sworn enemy of all cats, so he’s ever vigilant. (These were a gift to help Dean feel better. It’s working. We’re laughing at the cats.)

I spent my first day at the computer—kinda. I have a lot to catch up on, and I haven’t gotten to most of it. I did give myself some fiction writing time, which is good. It took a minute to remember what I had been doing, and then everything flooded out. I’m still dealing with medical professionals (three phone calls today), and a thousand other details concerning Dean’s health, but at least we’re not in crisis mode anymore.

Which…brings me to this week. I plan to get the blog done on time. I have other writing to do, and a lot of email to answer. If yours is one of those emails, please be patient. If you haven’t heard by next week, then please contact me again.

I know some of you noticed that the Recommended Reading List keeps popping up with nothing on it. That’s because I meant to finish it before the scheduled date and never managed it. I’ve deleted that file. I’ll write a new one, as soon as I get a chance.

In the meantime, I’ve been unable to do a lot of promotion on the projects we have going. They’re all holiday related.

First, the Halloween Storybundle is in its last few days (obviously). You can get 10 great dark fantasy ebooks for $25 and add a few dollars for our charity, Maui Strong. The folks in Hawai’i have lived through real horror, and now that the world has moved on to new horrors, have been forgotten. So please add a dollar or two for them. This bundle, which I curated, has work by Kevin J. Anderson, Annie Reed, J.F. Penn, and me. There are anthologies, like the Halloween anthology, edited by Mark Leslie, and a Pulphouse anthology edited by Dean Wesley Smith. And then! The bundle has four exclusive books that you can’t get anywhere else. Books by Rebecca Cantrell, Robert T. Jeschonek, Anthea Sharp, and Mark Leslie. If you want the exclusives, you absolutely have to act within the next three days or you’ll miss out entirely. Click here to go to the Storybundle.

In addition to the Storybundle, we’re running a Kickstarter which also ends this week. The Kickstarter is for the Holiday Spectacular, which starts in about 3 weeks. The Holiday Spectacular Calendar of Stories will give subscribers 40 stories—one per day— with a winter holiday theme (not just Christmas) between American Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. The Kickstarter has a ton of other goodies as well. And…we’ve hit five stretch goals (one a special goal) so all backers will get an extra five holiday stories (by me) as well as $600 in special workshops. As of this writing, though, the Kickstarter will end in 70 hours, so hurry over and pick up the calendar as well as a dozen other goodies.

If you’ve already picked up the Spectacular and the Halloween bundle, let me say thank you, thank you, thank you! I’m going to be that person, though. I’m going to ask for a favor. Please let your friends and family know about these. Because most of my time is spent in patient care right now, I’m not able to promote at the usual level—and Dean really isn’t. So every little share helps us more than you can imagine.

Thank you! (And thanks for indulging me on this somewhat personal post.)

Before you Diving fans ask, yes, I’m getting to Boss & Coop. I had to write this first. (And a few other things.)

For those of you who aren’t Diving fans, this novel is a great place to start. Parts of Ivory Trees have appeared in Asimov’s, including “The Break-In” in the current issue. You can read an excerpt here. Then I’d suggest picking up the magazine because this issue contains a lot of great fiction by really wonderful writers.

Every person who backs the Kickstarter will get an early ebook copy of Ivory Trees. Then you can pick and choose from the rewards, including some really cool sf merchandise (like pillows, blankets, and mugs) to online writing workshops as well as the entire series, should you want all your books in one place.

So head on over. The Kickstarter begins today. Join us!