Novel Review David Wake The Other Christmas Carol

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Watledge Books 2010-2013 A very dark edged rather bitter anti-Christmas story that is probably best read by children and grown-ups who are already aware that certain magical stories about the festive season may not be as true as they have been led to believe. For the first half of the book, this reads like a conventional Christmas story, Carol, daughter of Santa, wants to help deliver presents but she is deemed too young to go out on the deliveries. She finds a present that Santa dropped as he was setting off (thanks actually to her own efforts to stowaway on the delivery) and tries delivering it herself, assisted reluctantly by a retired Rudolf. The story then changes pace and tone as Carol finds that Santa and the elves are shameless capitalists, exploiting greed and marketing forces. Carol now finds herself under attack by elves, an army of snowmen, all called Frosty, and that her uncaring old father is largely indifferent. There is no happy miracle ending here, and familiar heroes meet a terrible end in an increasingly bleak vision that remain very well written. The warning on the cover that this Xmas story is not for children really means it. The story is narrated by an inanimate teddy bear, in Carol’s pocket, powerless to change the events he witnesses, a final relic of childhood in a World where Carol grows up before her time – funny in the style of many David Wake stories and also rather sad too. Even cynics like me who already accept that Xmas is not special after the age of eight, will find the presentation of the truth quite intense here. Arthur Chappell