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36 T H E B O C A R AT O N O B S E RV E R

Ah, the holidays. It’s a time when – once all the buying, wrapping and unwrapping is through – we get to kick back, relax and enjoy a good book (hopefully). This season is wrought with many varying emotions, from joy and anticipation to loneliness and stress, so it sets a colorful and compelling backdrop for all kinds of stories, like the ones you’ll find here.

While their plots aren’t necessarily about the holidays themselves, the following novels, including mysteries, satires and dramas, serve as the perfect fictional escape for this time of year. Happy holidays – and happy reading!

SEASON’S READINGSCozy Up To Holiday-Themed Novels This Winter;BY AMANDA VAN WYK

“A Christmas Escape” By Anne Perry

Best-selling author Anne Perry, known for her Monk and Thomas Pitt series, has amassed a devoted readership for her historical detec-tive novels, depicting the Victorian Era and the class struggles in Eng-land. And, every year, Perry gives readers a special treat in their stock-ings with a new holiday novella.

“A Christmas Escape” is Perry’s 13th. Hoping to ditch his mundane life, Charles Latterly trades the bus-tling cobblestone streets of London

for the crystal waters of the Medi-terranean. But his island getaway soon turns deadly when a body is found. It seems the killer, presum-ably among the inhabitants of his hotel, roams freely in the midst of an active volcano. London might have been more peaceful after all. Perry’s mouthwatering descriptions of na-tive foods are seamlessly interwoven with the mystery and suspense.

A story of transformation and the kindling of unexpected friend-ships, “A Christmas Escape” is a refreshing departure from the ste-reotypical Yuletide narrative.

A story of transformation

and the kindling of unexpected friendships, “A

Christmas Escape” is a refreshing

departure from the stereotypical

Yuletide narrative.

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“When Elves Attack” By Tim Dorsey

“Nobody does Florida weirdness quite like Tim Dorsey,” according to the Providence Journal, and the best-selling Tampa author captures holiday weirdness, too, in “When Elves Attack,” the 14th in his series about cheerfully deranged criminal mastermind Serge A. Storms.

The dark comedy contains all the elements of a typical holiday season but with a twist: shoppers trampling one another to death, arguments at the Thanksgiving dinner table, too much rum in the eggnog, etc.

Serge is the self-proclaimed neigh-borhood watchman. His homicidal tendencies result from a strong sense of moral justice, and his imagination knows no bounds. His first victim, a thief guilty of plundering “VFW posts that list the names of all the lo-cal patriots,” roasts like a Thanksgiv-ing turkey in an explosion caused by a deep fryer.

“When Elves Attack” captures the essence of the holidays in more ways than one, albeit a uniquely absurd and entertaining representation.

“Christmas Jars” By Jason F. Wright

“A Christmas Jar,” the book ex-plains, “is a pickle jar, peanut but-ter jar, or mason jar… to collect your spare change each day.” Just before Christmas, one anonymous-ly gifts the jar full of money to a person in need, making his or her holiday that much merrier.

More than just a novel, “Christ-mas Jars,” by New York Times best-selling author Jason F. Wright, inspired a real-life tradition. The sequence of events in Wright’s story – about rising newspaper reporter Hope Jensen, who is investigating the origins of the Christmas jars phenomenon after receiving one on her doorstep – has touched so many readers that a website was created for people to share their own experiences of giving and re-ceiving such jars.

Although a bit schmaltzy at times (it’s only Wright’s second novel after all), this small book packs a mighty punch on the subjects of faith, forgiveness and unexpected acts of kindness and generosity.

“The New Year’s Quilt: An Elm Creek Quilts Novel” By Jennifer Chiaverini

Author Jennifer Chiaverini depicts the elaborate craft of quilting by way of clever storytelling, making her New York Times best-selling Elm Creek Quilts series a modern classic. “Chiaverini’s prose … like the needlework she portrays, proves intricate, lovely, comforting, and uniquely American,” according to Publisher’s Weekly.

“The New Year’s Quilt,” center-ing on elderly newlywed and master quilter Sylvia Compson, is about or-dinary people whose joys and sorrows we can recognize in our own lives. More importantly, it’s about absolu-tion and kindness – about letting go and moving on.

Readers who have never done a stitch of needlework need not feel like uninvited guests at the holiday party. Chiaverini paints memorable charac-ters, focusing on relatable concepts of self-improvement and forgiveness. To fully enjoy the present, the story tells us, we must first reconcile those frac-tured familial relationships that cast their shadows on our future.

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“Festival of Deaths (The Gregor Demarkian Holiday Mysteries Book 10)” By Jane Haddam

When Orania Papazoglou began writ-ing about ex-FBI agent Gregor De-markian in “Not a Creature Was Stir-ring,” a finalist for the Edgar Award, she decided to adopt the pseudonym Jane Haddam. Thirty novels later, and Haddam still lives vicariously through her Gregor Demarkian tales, some of which are semi-autobiographical, ac-cording to the author.

“Festival of Deaths” is Haddam’s 10th mystery in the series. It’s Ha-nukkah, and Gregor is set to be a guest on a popular TV talk show, which explores the eccentricities of its guests and their sexual lives. But, before filming can begin, two corpses are found, and Gregor feels compelled to help his detective friend capture the killer and save the celebrity host of the show.

He steps behind the scenes and becomes embroiled in unexpected politics and hostilities. Eventually, the Hanukkah connection becomes more apparent – and important – as a clue surfaces in the form of dreidels. O

“When Elves Attack” contains all the elements of a typical holiday season but with a twist: shoppers trampling

one another to death, arguments at the Thanksgiving dinner table, too much rum in the eggnog, etc.