by Kim Newman
First published 2024
Lynda and her teenage son Rust begin their Christmas preparations in the British countryside. They hang lights and craft decorations, but something goes wrong from the start. The first advent calendar chocolate tastes bitter and strange. An unsigned Christmas card arrives for Rust with an aggressive message instead of holiday cheer. More cards follow daily, each one darker than the last. Lynda remembers a childhood TV show with similar events, but she can find no proof it ever aired. Their festive preparations crumble as dead robins replace the plastic decorations, the turkey rots in the freezer, and Rust grows sick. The cards keep coming, poisoning their holiday spirit day by day. Lynda begins to question whether her own childhood Christmases were as happy as she recalls, or if something darker lurked beneath the surface all along.
Genres: christmas, mystery, horror, ghost-stories
Vibes: atmospheric, dark, suspenseful
Tropes: gaslighting, unreliable-narrator
Setting: British Countryside
Period: Christmas
160 pages · Hardcover · Titan Books
Content warnings: anxiety, depression, mental-illness