About The Book
Inspired by an Icelandic book-gifting tradition, this beautiful story, illustrated with full colour artwork throughout, and decorated endpapers, is the perfect gift for sharing during the Christmas period.
It was Christmas Eve in the little farmhouse. The air was full of good smells of spices and jam and hot cocoa. No one was expecting any presents, but there would be leaf bread, and cookies, and Grandmother’s embroidered tablecloth, and they would all do what they could to make the Yuletide bright.
Picking his way home across the lava field, Tómas knows that this Christmas won’t be quite the same – not without his Grandfather. But as the war draws closer, Tómas devises a plan to ensure his Grandfather’s stories will still be at the heart of his family’s Christmas – even if it means being braver than a boy ever dreamed he could be. Donning his grandfather’s jumper for courage, working hard at chores for neighbours, he takes his hard earned pennies to shop for presents – only to find all the shops empty of stock. This is war time and rationing. There is just one shop still open – a bookshop.
Inspired by the Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóðið, where books are given as gifts on Christmas Eve.
Reading age: 5 – 7
About the Author
Katherine Woodfine is the author of the Sunday Times bestselling novel The Clockwork Sparrow, which was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize. She has since written eight more books in the Sinclair’s Mysteries and Taylor & Rose Secret Agents series, as well as books for younger readers, including Sophie Takes to the Sky, Elisabeth and the Box of Colours and A Dancer’s Dream. When not writing, Katherine also reviews children’s books for The Week Junior. She is based in Lancashire.
Lizzy Stewart is an illustrator and author from Plymouth, currently based in South London. She has written and illustrated three picture books for children and five illustrated books for adults. In 2017 she won the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize and a World Illustration Award for There’s a Tiger in the Garden. She teaches picture book illustration at Goldsmiths University.
