The Perfect Christmas Read

Only a really quick blog today as am in a mad panic to do all of my last minute Christmas shopping, okay change that, I am in a mad panic to do all of my Christmas shopping full stop.

Quite a few people have asked me in the lead up to Christmas what makes the perfect Christmas read. In all honestly I don’t actually know. I suppose people would automatically say Charles Dicken’s Christmas Stories which of course includes the famous ‘Christmas Carol’ and Scrooge who everyone thinks of at Christmas. I personally don’t tend to read themed books unless I am going on holiday and then like to read a tale that’s set where I am going. I do like a good guilty pleasure read over Christmas though.

I mean you are filled with lots of gorgeous food, you have possibly gotten up really early if there are kids in the house, everyone is off watching The Sound of Music, Doctor Who or some Christmas Special I love to sit and read a good M.C. Beaton and of course one of my favourite characters from my guilty pleasure series of ‘Agatha Raisin Mysteries’. When I was looking up Christmas books I fell across a new Agatha Raisin I hadn’t seen before ‘Agatha Raisin and Kissing Christmas Goodbye’ which looks simply wonderful. I can’t begin to imagine what madness, murder and mayhem happens to Agatha in the festive season. I would have bought this for myself for tomorrow on my manic shopping spree later only as you know I have to read everything in order.

For those of you who don’t here is the blurb. During the dark, grey days of early December, Agatha is obsessed by only two things - Christmas, and her ex, James Lacey. Although she says she feels nothing for James now, she feels sure that landing the perfect Dickensian Christmas for all her friends will somehow reanimate her love. Even the murder of a Mrs Tamworthy, poisoned with hemlock at the local manor house, does little to distract Agatha from organizing her perfect yuletide celebrations. And yet it should do, as Mrs Tamworthy had written to Agatha, telling her that one of her family wanted to see her dead before the year was out. Slightly guiltily (and belatedly), Agatha sets out to solve the case with the help of her new recruit, young Toni Gilmour. You have got to admit that sounds like the perfect book to curl up in a cosy chair somewhere and read for a few hours full of delicious food and festive cheer, maybe I will get round to this one next year.

Have a wonderful Christmas!