30 November 2008

CHRISTMAS BOOKS REVIEW

• Christmas Through a Child's Eyes, Helen Szymanski
Here's a great bedtime book for the Christmas season. These are very short personal memories about Christmas from over a dozen writers, many stressing stories of hard times during the Depression and World War II, when an orange and some candy was an exciting gift and that one special gift, even if it was used, could make your day. Some stories are about a child giving up a beloved gift to someone else who has nothing. All are heartwarming, although some are rather amateurish in style.

• Take Joy!, Tasha Tudor
From childhood reading the unforgettable The Secret Garden, I was in love with Tasha Tudor's lovely, delicate drawings and watercolors. I ended up buying a hardback of Secret Garden simply to get her color illustrations. Take Joy! is a mixed confection of a few Christmas stories and poems, Christmas music, small legends of Christmas, and a section talking of Christmas preparations at Tudor's Vermont farm, all liberally decorated with color and black-and-white illustrations of birds, children, biblical figures, Christmas plants, decorations, homes and fields of snow, animals, and of course the corgis of Tasha's "Corgi Cottage." For Christmas and Tudor lovers everywhere!

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