Christmas Cheer: A Collection of Holiday Tales: A Collection of Holiday Tales

by Sally Grindley

Just in time for the holidays, this beautiful collection of Christmas tales is perfect for the whole family to share. Both original stories and reinventions of the classics, featuring everything from an under-the-weather Rudolph to a boy who can't make up his mind when writing to Santa Claus, are brought to life with illustrations by some of the most beloved artists in children's books. Christmas Cheer captures the warmth and excitement of the Christmas season, inviting the family to cozy up around the fire and take time to enjoy the holiday spirit.

80 pages, Hardcover

First published September 30, 2008

About the author

I came into children's books originally as Editorial Director of a nationwide children's book club, though I had written and directed a children's play while a student at Sussex University, which was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe. I wrote my first two children's picture books in 1984 and was lucky enough that Anthony Browne wanted to illustrate the second - Knock Knock Who's There? It was published in 1985, is still going strong today and is one of my most successful.

Shhh! was published in 1991 and has known great success in France/Belgium in particular (close on 300,000 copies sold). It's success in the UK - it won the Children's Book Award - was hampered by the liquidation of its original publisher.

I became a full-time author in 1995 and now have some 150+ titles published, the most recent being L'Histoire du Soir in France, Belgium and Italy.

Feather Wars, published in 2003, was my first sortie into young fiction and was followed by the very successful Spilled Water, which has been published in some ten different languages and is very popular in schools as a class reader. It won the Nestle Smarties Gold Award (and I wound up being a 'Pointless' answer on the back of it!) Broken Glass came next and was a Sunday Times Book of the Week.

I'm currently working on picture books again and have plans to illustrate one of my own in the not too distant future - watch this space!

Reviews

[Calista · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of children's Christmas tales. Contents: The Reluctant Fairy - I think this might be my favorite one. This is about the fairy tree topper. This fairy didn't want to be a tree topper and it's about her.

Good News. This is about a sheep who sees the Jesus star and leaves her flock and goes searching out the Christ Child. Sweet story

Dear Santa- A kid can't make up his mind so he has to resend his letter to Santa for several days in a row.

The Enormous Cake - a Mother decides to back and she wants the biggest and best cake for her kids. Well, it can feed the neighborhood.

Almost Perfect - A Sweet tale about an elf who gets locked in Santa's workshop on Christmas Eve and misses the party. He mends the broken toys that no one wanted. This was a lovely story.

Snowy Snowy Night was about a girl who wanted a white Christmas for Christmas. It never snows on Christmas anymore. Yet, the girl is given the gift of snow in a magical night. As much as I love snow, I loved this little story as I always want a white Christmas too.

Jesus is Born - the is the tale of Mary and Joseph. They come to Nazareth looking for a place to stay. A short version of the birth and angels singing.

The Christmas Mouse - This was a very cute story. I enjoyed it. A little mouse is surprised to see a big tree in the house and very curious about the tree and what's under it. She sees sweets to eat that have been left out for her. She finds a nativity scene and she claims it as her home. Very cute and funny.

There are some good stories in here. We enjoyed this book.

[Marianna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute stories for Christmas...