Christmas Short Stories Anthology

Eleventh story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. What could be more festive than a trip to see Santa at the local shopping centre? Depends on who’s gunning for Santa…

First story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. Billy Partridge wasn’t really cut out to be a cat burglar, but it was ‘do the job, or come up with thirteen grand by Thursday, or have both legs shattered’.‘Do the job’ seemed the least worst option. But he’s about to find out just how bad the least worst option can be….

Fifth story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. There is never a good time to look upon the face of a dead loved one. But Mr Unwin has dedicated his life to helping the bereaved. While helping himself at the same time….

The final story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. It’s Christmas Eve, but the criminals never stop working, so neither do the police. The raid is on... but things don’t go entirely to plan.

Ninth story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. Kayleigh’s a professional. But lap-dancing has rules. And when someone breaks the rules….

Second story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. When a double suicide arrives at the city morgue, Sandra thinks it’s a Christmas like any other. But she’s about to get a very nasty shock – make that two very nasty shocks….

Tenth story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. Lord Peter Forsyth-Leven, MSP, is about to discover that having it all just means you’ve got more to lose….

This short story, "El Espejo de Navidad", is in Spanish. It is about a father, who is having a hard time letting go of his daughter, as she comes to the point, where she no longer believes... in Papa Noel(Santa).

Fourth story in a collection of interlinked tales of crime and retribution laced with dark humour, set around the festive season. Working in a call centre normally offers few career opportunities. But it looks as if Tracy’s about to get her big break.

After a blizzard in New York City, a huge snowman appears mysteriously outside of Grand Central Station and everyday seems to grow larger while also appearing at another door. What at first was funny becomes more and more menacing. Elsewhere in Grand Central, a man with an icy soul named Clinton Rudge fumes with anger at the cheerful holidaymakers filling the station. After making an evil wish, he vanishes....

American writer William Dean Howells delights us with his cautiously cynical yet endearing telling of the night before Christmas at the Fountain household. Published in The Daughter of the Storage and Other Things in Prose and Verse in 1916, Howells’ sense of realism and social criticism hides behind the humorous banter between Mr. and Mrs. Fountain, as well as relatives passing by. Raging consumerism, New Year’s resolutions, lovingly marital insults, reflections and memories, and a whole bunch of bathrobes!

While doing some last-minute shopping on Christmas Eve, a man has a magical experience. He watches a child preparing to get on Santa's lap through a shop window and is reminded about a special Christmas memory. When the child gets down, Santa makes eye contact with the man, and they are immediately taken back to a moment they had shared (in his past). So the story unfolds as he stares through a window of time at a glimpse from Christmas past....

In Aunt Cyrilla's Christmas Basket, Lucy Rose tries to talk her folksy Aunt Cyrilla out of bringing her big, bulgy, funny-looking basket to the city to deliver Christmas goodies to their relatives in the city. When their train is stranded during a snow storm, Aunt Cyrilla and her fellow passengers team up to provide a proper Christmas morning for the little ones in their care.

Christmas is one of the best times for huddling round the fire, wrapping up in a cozy blanket and telling each other stories. Storyteller Vicky Parsons brings a series of Christmas stories to charm and delight the whole family. Her lyrical style and humour gives a unique take on age-old stories, and new stories from her own imagination.

Queens, New York, in the early 1970s. During the holidays, a small boy dishonors his mother and learns a lesson. Maybe more than one. Maybe not.

Flagged down by Inspector LaStrade of Scotland Yard as they walk through the icy winter streets, Holmes and Watson are transported to the home of the aristocratic Lady Whitebread. Once there, she tells them her traditional holiday centerpiece has vanished in the midst of the Christmas dinner - right under the very noses of her guests. The decoration? An enormous work of the jeweler's art centered upon a three inch round emerald called...the Christmas Jewel.

Vasilisa had not seen her daughter for four years. Her daughter, Yefimya, had gone after her wedding to Petersburg, had sent them two letters, and since then had seemed to vanish out of their lives; there had been no sight nor sound of her. And whether the old woman was milking her cow at dawn or heating her stove or dozing at night, she was always thinking of one and the same thing - what was happening to Yefimya, whether she were alive.... Read in English, unabridged.

On the surface Norman is not the perfect Christmas tree, but just because he is different to the other trees, he is no less special and no less deserving of a happy home full of love.

Runyon's short stories are almost always told in the first person by a narrator who is never named and whose role is unclear; he knows many gangsters and has no job that can be gleaned from his musings, nor does he admit to any criminal involvement; he’s a bystander, an observer, an average street-corner Joe. Runyon described himself as 'being known to one and all as a guy who is just around'. That line seems to say a lot about Runyon and his life.

A collection of three Christmas classics by a cherished American writer, to warm the soul and intrigue the listener with satisfyingly unexpected plot twists.