title: A Literary Christmas: Great Contemporary Christmas Stories
author: Lilly Golden
description: In this treasury of seasonal tales, the common theme is often just a peg on which a heavy cloak is hung. To be sure, there is an occasional snowfall, a slow dawning of warm feeling for humanity (or at least family), a Christmas ham and even a starving urchin. But it is their distinctively modern mien that truly unites these 27 stories and makes this volume a worthy addition to the shelf the Christmas works of Dickens and O. Henry have anchored for so long. For every story with what Golden calls an "emphasis on communion in a secular sense," such as Leo Rosten's "The Night of the Magi" and Ron Carlson's "The H Street Sledding Record," a sweet paean to love and family life, there is one about loneliness and disaffection, such as Patricia Highsmith's "A Clock Ticks at Christmas" and Hortense Calisher's "A Christmas Carillon." With stories by Italo Calvino and Ivan Klima, which offer social commentary in fable form, one can experience a postmodern Christmas; then again, stories by Grace Paley, Sean O'Faolain, Ntozake Shange and Toni Cade Bambara depict multicultural Christmases. Noel as seen here may not always be joyous, but it is certainly sophisticated. <br />Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
zlib_text: SLEIGH BELLS AND
  SLEUTHING
  1 6  COZ Y MYSTERY HOLIDAY NOVELLAS FEATURING
  FEMALE SLEUTHS
  
  CAROLYN RIDDER ASPENSON  RITTER AMES
  S.E. BABIN  MORGANA BEST  SAM CHEEVER
  STEPHANIE DAMORE  LORAINE J  HUDSON
  CLARE K AUTER  AVA MALLORY  MONA MARPLE
  TARA MEYERS  K . E. O’ CONNOR  LARISSA REINHART
  TRICIA L SANDERS  J ENNA ST. J AMES  LAINA TURNER
  GOOD FORTUNE FARM REFUGE
  
  CONTENTS
  Foreword
  CAROLYN RIDDER ASPENSON
  THE CLAUS KILLING
  RITTER AMES
  ORGANIZED FOR CHRISTMAS WISHES
  S.E. BABIN
  THE CANINE CONUNDRUM
  MORGANA BEST
  A CHEMISTREE OF WITCHES
  SAM CHEEV ER
  FAMILIAR HIJINKS
  STEPHANIE DAMORE
  DECADENT DEMISE
  LORAINE J. HUDSON
  THE CHRISTMAS BUTTON
  CLARE KAUTER
  STRANGLE ALL THE WAY
  AV A MALLORY
  MISFITS & MISTLETOES
  MONA MARPLE
  THE ROBBERY OF MYSTIC SPRINGS
  TARA MEYERS
  A ONE HORSE OPEN SLAY
  K. E. O’CONNOR
  GHOSTLY FOWL
  LARISSA REINHART
  A CHRISTMAS QUICK SKETCH
  
  TRICIA L. SANDERS
  HARK! A HOMICIDE
  JENNA ST. JAMES
  CHRISTMAS TREES & FELONIES
  LAINA TURNER
  HOLIDAY LIGHTS OUT
  A BONUS NOV ELLA!
  AV A MALLORY
  WITCHE