Booklists · Holiday Books

Food Network host Paula Deen shows you how to prepare tasty dishes and celebrate the holidays with southern flair. Deen’s faithful followers will also appreciate the family photographs and anecdotes sprinkled throughout the text.

Take the hassle out of entertaining with the “Diva of Do-Ahead”! She has creative ideas for invitations, tips for deciding how much food to make, lists of essential equipment, and detailed party plans for twelve holidays, including Christmas and New Year’s.

The owner of a bakery shares recipes “reflecting her made-with-love-from scratch philosophy and the tastes of small town Texas.” Recipes are organized by occasion (“Holiday Open House,” “Ranch Barn Brunch,” “Edible Gifts,” etc.) and include a splendid variety of possibilities, including Cornbread Dressing, Hot Mocha Cakes, Mustard Baked Ham, Old Fashioned Egg Nog, and Cheese Crispies. Yum!

Between cooking, shopping, and entertaining, getting ready for the holidays can be overwhelming. Diane Worthington has plenty of useful suggestions for taking the stress out of your holiday preparations.

Kornfeld’s “flexitarian” menus are designed to take the struggle out of accommodating the dietary preferences of your dinner table guests. The menus include recipes to appeal to just about everyone—from vegetarians to carnivores to those who are allergic to dairy products or nuts.

A new collection of tried and true recipes from the kitchens of Gooseberry Patch.

A collection of over 250 “cherished family recipes” from the readers of American Profile magazine.

Discover the roles that food and fellowship play in the celebration of Kwanzaa and other holidays to people of African descent.

Susie Fishbein has assembled an eclectic selection of kosher recipes and imaginative suggestions for unforgettable parties. Brief descriptions of the traditions and significance of each holiday are also included.

Instead of heading out to the mall, why not make some homemade goodies for friends and family this year? You’ll find plenty of irresistible possibilities in this book, including old fashioned peanut brittle, decorative holiday preserves, candy cane cookies, and pumpkin-hazelnut cheesecake.

Everything you need to prepare for Christmas—“from ideas for homemade gifts to recipes for the main entrée at the holiday meal.”

Mouthwatering recipes and creative ideas for decorating and entertaining from the editors of Southern Living magazine.

Scrambling to find a recipe for a chocolate dessert that will dazzle your guests? Medrich has dozens of suggestions!

Each of the 75 recipes in this “field guide” is supported with baking tips, storage information, and symbols signifying which recipes are quick to fix, fun to make with kids, sturdy enough to mail, extra fancy and keep well.

Intimidated by the idea of throwing a party? This indispensable guide from InStyle magazine has everything you need (themes, menus, decorating tips, timetables, etc.) to plan a memorable, stress-free celebration.

Make your house the envy of your neighbors with this handy little guide from the owner of an outdoor decorating business. Finkle starts with the basics (“Know Your Power Source,” “Gear and Accessories”) and then walks you through the planning and installation stages. And, in case you’re stuck for ideas, he also offers 12 different decorating schemes!

Spruce up the house this season with one of these festive projects.

Fry offers readers suggestions for creative and inexpensive ways to use candles to “create a warm and festive space for holiday entertaining.”

The authors of Home Swell Home: Designing Your Dream Pad bring their “signature mix of spirit and style” to Christmas.

Looking for some ways to dramatically transform your home for the holidays? Staron and Pranga (known as “Dr. Christmas”) offer a dazzling variety of possibilities—from Victorian to Country Warmth to Tropical Delight.

Beginner and experienced beaders are sure to find something that captures their fancy in this new book from Wood (Quick and Clever Beading). How about a ribbon gift bag? Or a string of pompom lights?

Lots of fun projects for both the beginning and expert knitter. Each pattern is supported with clear instructions and detailed illustrations and is categorized as a “Quick Craft,” “Plan-Ahead Project,” or a “Long-Term Luxury.”

Quick and easy projects to add a festive flair to the dinner table. Each project is accompanied with simple step-by-step instructions and photographs.

You’ll find plenty of Christmas gift opportunities in this collection of patterns created by designers from around the country. The styles range from traditional to funky, and best of all, were written with the beginning knitter in mind.

Interested in making a unique holiday gift for family or friends? Knitting expert Falick has assembled “an eclectic collection of more than 50 original gifts, decorations, and clothing pieces.”

Quick and easy projects for crafters of all ages. Each project is accompanied with simple step-by-step instructions and photographs.

Create “heirloom-quality, one-of-a-kind ornaments, tableware and gift items” for your family and friends.

Add a vintage flavor to your holiday swith this new book. Projects are arranged by theme: “Victorian Vintage”, “Shabby Chic”, “Country”, and “Personal Vintage”.

Fresh and imaginative suggestions for transforming your home and celebrating the holidays.

Add a festive touch to your house with one of the "quick-to-create" projects in this book, including pillows, a tree skirt, appliqué ornaments, and an angel table runner.

Cotswold investigator Agatha Raisin looks forward to a warm, traditional Christmas dinner with her ex-husband. But Agatha’s attention turns instead to the murder of a wealthy matriarch poisoned by hemlock at her 80th birthday celebration.

A rebellious act by a cadet at Fleet Battle School—a small gift given in celebration of Sinterklaas Day—begins a dialogue at the academy, concerning religious tolerance and the spirit of giving. This is an usual seasonal science fiction novel in Card’s long-running Ender Wiggins series.

Dr. Jonas Concannon returns to his quiet hometown in Vermont and gets a second chance at love when he runs into Bridgit, his high school sweetheart, a single mom raising her daughter, Molly. Veteran romance author Dailey delivers a tender tale of love at Christmas time.

A catering gig for a holiday breakfast at the Aspen Meadow Library results in other than seasonal mirth, when the murdered body of a former D.A. is found on the premises. This is the 14th entry in the tasty culinary mystery series featuring Colorado caterer Goldy Schulz.

The stories in this collection by Dr. Jerry Dickey capture the spirit of Christmas and offer readers hope and inspiration for the holiday season.

A widowed mother of three finds romance with a UPS driver, who has returned to his hometown in Maine to care for his ailing father. Readers of the heartwarming Misty Harbor romance series will enjoy this tale of holiday love.

As disagreeable family members gather at her home in Charleston, 93-year old matriarch Theodora longs for Christmases past, when Pearl, her mother’s beloved housekeeper, ensured everything was perfect. With a sprinkling of Gullah magic, Pearl comes back as a spirit to restore family traditions in a festive Low Country celebration of Christmas.

Raised in San Francisco by a single mother, Miranda Carson travels to England over the Christmas holiday to search for the father whom she has never met. Gunn offers a warmhearted tale about discovering a place to belong at this special time of year.

In one of two splendid holiday tales, Knight offers a poignant novella concerning a father and his two grown sons, who continue to struggle with Christmas years after the wife and mother of the family has passed away.

Macomber reprises her delightful trio of angels—Shirley, Goodness, and Mercy—for further spiritual assignments (and mischief) on Earth, during the Yuletide season.

Manhattan mystery author and amateur sleuth Maggie Kelly receives a Christmas greeting of a very unpleasant nature in this fifth entry in a sequence that combines fantasy-mystery and Chick Lit romance.

The author of the extraordinary memoir Caterpillar Kisses (2005) presents vignettes of seven women coping with personal problems during the holiday season. By turns comic and touching, these stories illuminate the magic of the Christmas season.

Four popular teen authors, Hailey Abbott, Melissa de la Cruz, Aimee Friedman, and Nina Malkin offer a wide variety of tales for the Holiday season.

Looking for the best gift suggestions, fashion tips, party ideas, recipes and craft ideas for this holiday season? Look no further! Princess Mia has the complete guide to help make the most of your holiday season.

Princess Mia hopes to spend the perfect Christmas with her boyfriend, Michael, and her best friend, Lilly as all three travel to Genovia for the Holidays.

Katie thinks only a miracle can make her holiday wish come true. She wants a family, something she doesn’t have as a foster child. Seventeen-year-old Matt is in a foster home, too, and finally feeling like he belongs. But will Matt’s attempt at a holiday good deed destroy Katie’s dreams of happiness?

While spending Christmas in London with her family, her boyfriend, and his family, fifteen-year-old Kendra finds herself roaming the city in another scavenger hunt, like the one in New York the previous summer (Remember Me to Harold Square).

Thirteen-year-old Ben is annoyed by an eleven-year-old, know-it-all girl who threatens the fun of his family’s vacation in the Florida Keys, but he has other worries, especially anxiety about his friend’s reaction when she opens the necklace he gave her for Christmas.

While gathered together for the Christmas holiday, a large New Zealand family and their guests find their lives suddenly invaded by three fascinating but rather sinister brothers.

Paul Nicholas has always loved everything about Christmas, from the presents to the carols to the reindeer. But when the mall Santa steals Paul’s girlfriend, Christmas lights nearly burn his house down and his mom gets fired, Paul feels distinctly anti-Christmas. Can Paul rekindle his holiday spirit or will he turn into a modern day scrooge?

Young girls are being murdered and the only person who can help the police find “The Christmas Killer” is a psychic teen who receives messages from the murder victims in her dreams.

A small West Virginia town in 1927 is getting ready for Christmas but Joan Lee is disappointed that her family may not be taking part in the celebration.

A rhyming story starring a family of cuddly terry cloth chicks with knit caps and scarves who play in the snow, sing, make cookies, decorate the tree, and hang up their stockings.

Santa is missing and a variety of Arctic animals set out to find him. The simple language, rhyming text, and endearing illustrations are sure to inspire repeat readings.

Minerva Louise mistakes Christmas Eve preparations for a party, Santa for a farmer, and the reindeer for goats wearing fancy hats. Can the confusion be cleared up in time for Christmas?

Bella, a little mouse, who helps her family get ready for Christmas, continually asks when Santa will come. The answer is always “soon”—until finally it’s Christmas Eve and Santa is on his way.

On Christmas morning, Trevor discovers that the one thing he wanted most—a puppy—is the one thing he forgot to ask for. Trevor spends the entire next year making endless lists of all the Christmas presents he wants, until the cartons filled with his notepads stretch all the way from his house to the post office.

Cincinnati native Will Hillenbrand tells the the story of a scrawny young rooster named Harold, who has to taken over the morning wake-up duties despite his timid voice. He is unsuccessful at crowing and waking the other animals, so the routine of the farm is upset and the animals are cranky. When the baby Jesus is born in the stable on the farm, Harold hears about the Good News from a shepherd. After meeting the Christ Child himself, the little rooster finds his own voice at last and feels empowered to develop his own loud announcement to the world about the news from the stable.

Small Camel, the youngest in Balthazar’s corral, has joined his first caravan. Balthazar has set aside a light, little bundle for Small Camel: one special package. The caravan joins with two more men and continues on, following a single star over the desert. At last, the caravan stops in a town, and Small Camel discovers what he has been carrying—presents for the baby Jesus.

This the fourth book in the Russell series and his first Christmas adventure. After witnessing Santa’s spectacular Christmas Eve sleigh crash, the woolly wonder snaps into action to save the holiday and get the man of the hour—and a clever new mode of toy transport—back in flight

Best friends Toot and Puddle struggle with what to get each other for Christmas. They know that “the best present was usually something you made yourself, a one-of-a-kind thingamajig, not just a whatsit anyone could buy in a store.” Will they think of something in time for Christmas?

The students from the Twelve Days of Kindergarten return for more counting fun!

In this cheerfully illustrated rhyming story, Santa celebrates Kwanzaa with his family after delivering completing his Christmas Eve deliveries.

Turn the candle-shaped pages in this sparkly foil board book to learn about the eight days of Hanukah.

The Beene children grumble when asked to share their meager Christmas dinner with a homeless woman and her child but their act of generosity teaches them an important lesson about the meaning of Christmas.

’Tis the season for holidays and Blue’s friends are celebrating in their own special ways! Join Blue and Joe as they discover and share in the traditions of Christmas, Chanukah, and Kwanzaa.

Through her research for this anthology, which includes poems, carols, short fiction, letters (including one from a five-year-old Caroline to Santa), and scriptural passages, Kennedy “learned about the history of Christmas in America, the layers of meaning and experience, and the powerful and often conflicting emotions that are wound up in the holiday.”

Short heartwarming stories about the true meaning of Christmas.

“From the hilarious to the snarky, the poignant to the poetic, this collection proves there are as many ways to spell Chanukah as there are ways to celebrate it.”

Stories, poems, carols, recipes, tips on choosing and decorating a tree, crafts, and traditions from around the world—all in one delightful book.

“Christmas curiousities and winter wonders” from Matt Groening and The Simpsons.

Forbes offers readers an engaging, informative overview of the secular and religious traditions associated with Christmas.

Overwhelmed by the stress of getting ready for the holidays? Rhea (described as “the Christian readers’ Erma Bombeck”) has plenty of light-hearted tips to help you cope with the holiday frenzy.

This all-purpose guide from Hallmark offers decorating tips, party ideas, seasonal menus, gift ideas, and creative suggestions for creating keepsakes and reusing gift wrap and holiday cards.

Think the holiday decorations on your neighbor’s house are over the top? Chuck Smith has gathered pictures from around the world of homes with the best and brightest displays.