Book rêveur

By now it`s the best of three Christmas books I`ve read this year. It`s non-fiction, quite light and entertaining, but still you can feel that author has done a really big research before writing this "short summary" about old Christmas time traditions in Europe.

It wasn`t always about fun, joy, light, lots of eating and Christmas shopping. In ancient times Christmas time was longer and it was quite a lot about elves, dead spirits, old pagan gods mixing with christian saints, Wild Hunt, werewolves, home-sprites and other spooky creatures. Those were dark and scary times. Author quotes old Scandinavian, British and German fairy tales and legends and it`s really interesting to see what`s behind those stories. If one wishes to celebrate Christmas in old-time style, author gives recipes for some food and patterns for decorations.