“Outside of a dog, man’s best friend is a book” wrote Groucho Marx. Adding “Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.”

We are always surrounded by darkness at Christmas. This year the match of the festive spirit seems difficult to ignite. Never mind, a book is the perfect pressie that informs, educates and entertains. It rarely needs charging and generally delights the soul. I read a lot of books and blog about them so you can make an educated guess as to what a distant relative might like. It’s kind of my thing.

Christmas is always good for a ghost story, so I would recommend Small Angels by Lauren Owen, by a long branch the best thing I’ve read this year. I read a proof copy in May, three months ahead of its publication and it was enough to give me nightmares then. Sam and Kate plan their wedding in the eponymous church in Sam’s childhood village and are terrorised by the spirit of the woods, Mockbeggar. Partially about the sacrifice of love, partially about love on your own terms, but eloquently terrifying all the same.

Marian Keyes returned with Again, Rachel. A sort of sequel to her 1998 novel Rachel’s Holiday. Our heroine is now counsellor at the rehab she attended, and she has settled for life on her own terms. All that equilibrium is blown by the return of her ex, Luke. Keyes has a lightness of touch that few novelists possess. She is a comic novelist with a mellow side. The Walsh family are a deft creation of lunatics, but there is also the sense of wisdom that comes with loss.

I’m going to cheat here, which is appropriate as Christmas is a time for mischief. The Stranding by Kate Sawyer was originally published in 2021, but this year saw its paperback release. It’s a sadly overlooked work, which is often filed as Sci-Fi. But it has a growing reputation – a Radio 4 Book At Bedtime and it’s currently being adapted for the big (or small) screen. Set at Christmas and ending at Christmas, Ruth escapes the apocalypse with a photographer in the belly of a dead whale. The narrative is split in two, meeting at the end of the novel. By which time, you’ll probably need a lie down and a good cry. Possibly both.

In non-fiction, let’s start with The Slow Road to Tehran, Rebecca Lowe’s journal of her bike ride across The Middle East. It’s full of delicious details, but tautly written enough to make the mouth gape at bike crashes and broken laptops. It’s expansive enough to explain the politics and culture of the area, but with the human touch of people just wanting to be happy.

Anthony Beevor’s books take roughly four years to write and research. They are always grimly fascinating, but with a strangely addictive quality. Russia suggests topical connotations but looks at The Russian Civil War following The October Revolution. Beevor doesn’t stint on the gore and lunacy of conflict, but also throws details into his prose that are incredible – such as The Tsar having a military band in one room of his palace, which played The National Anthem when he walked in.

Janina Ramirez is the smiley face of TV history. Femina looked at the woman of the Middle Ages, erased from history by The Reformation (the title was written on documents created by women). In some small part, Ramirez is returning them to our collective consciousness. It’s well-researched enough to stand as an academic work but is engagingly written to work as something that can be read in chapters, with one woman, lost from history in each.

Madly, Deeply: The Alan Rickman Diaries was everything I thought it would be. Rickman is a still a great loss to the acting world. Alan Taylor edits his thoughts and elegantly scripted journals into a cohesive whole. A man who is quietly proud of his films, but actively hates the boy wizard who conjures up the fame and fortune he secretly craves. It’s a classic of the genre, up there with the diaries of Richard Burton and Alec Guinness.

Finally, A Pocketful Of Happiness is Richard E Grant’s account of losing his wife Joan. It’s easy to dismiss it as a light, frothy, insubstantial read. But there is real weight in here. He’s starry-eyed as ever, but it portrays grief and loss in a more deeply personal way than Kubler-Ross ever could.

Merry Christmas. Buy your books locally. Know that better, brighter times and days are coming for us all.

Kev McCready