Weekend picks for book lovers, special Christmas edition

What should you read this weekend? USA TODAY’s picks for book lovers include a festive collection of new books that celebrate Christmas, both fiction and non-fiction.

Christmas: A Biography by Judith Flanders; Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s, 256 pp.; non-fiction

It’s the most wonderful time of the year, as the song goes. Christmas means parties and eggnog and presents and tree-trimming and oh yes, carols on an endless loop.

How did we get here? London-based author Judith Flanders answers the question in Christmas: A Biography, a detailed history that effortlessly whisks us from Biblical times to the present, with many stops along the way in various countries and cultures.

The book is stuffed with surprising revelations (why there are “12 days of Christmas,” how tipping became a holiday must, when mistletoe was first dangled overhead) and things you’ve probably never thought about as you rush around finishing last-minute shopping (when did Rudolph first flash his red nose? 1939, in a pamphlet created for retailer Montgomery Ward).

Flanders relegates the so-called “War on Christmas” to a mere footnote, while happily celebrating the holiday over the centuries and debunking plenty of myths. Eating, drinking and making merry have always been part of Christmas. In a tug of war between the religious and secular, the latter usually wins.

And dreaming of an even whiter Christmas, it seems, has long been a misty-eyed tradition. We are forever remembering “that wondrous, nostalgically flawless day that is seared in our memories, the day we can never quite recapture, the perfect Christmas,” Flanders writes.

USA TODAY says ★★★½ out of four. “Fascinating…lively.”

Mr. Dickens and His Carol by Samantha Silva; Flatiron, 288 pp.; fiction

It’s November 1843 and Charles Dickens, on a tight deadline and in debt, must write the book that will become a Christmas classic. But wait, who is the lovely, elusive Eleanor Lovejoy, a mysterious would-be muse for our writer hero?

USA TODAY says ★★★. “Tis the season, happily for fans of A Christmas Carol, for getting Scrooged.”

A Christmas Novel by Annie England Noblin; William Morrow, 369 pp.; fiction

After a messy divorce and sudden move to Memphis, Brydie Benson finds herself as a former wife, a former bakery owner and a soon-to-be former house guest of her best friend, Elliott. Enter drooling Teddy Roosevelt, a pug, and his elderly owner, Pauline Neumann, who needs a house- and dog-sitter after she moves into assisted living.

USA TODAY says ★★★. “Both lighthearted and life-affirming. Readers are in for a sweet treat.”

The Noel Diary by Richard Paul Evans; Simon & Schuster, 283 pp.; fiction

It’s December, and Jacob Churcher, a best-selling author, must revisit a rough childhood and clean up the Salt Lake City home of his estranged, abusive mother after she dies. A mysterious woman named Rachel knocks on the door looking for her own mom.

USA TODAY says ★★★ . “Explores complicated morals and emotions while warming your heart.”

The Usual Santas, by various writers; Soho Crime, 400 pp.; fiction

Collects 18 Christmas capers full of bloody holiday spirit and ho-ho-homicide, spanning continents and centuries as well as a broad range of the genre.

USA TODAY says ★★★. “What these Christmas stories have in common is the humanity at the core of crime — the ugliness, the anxiety, the generosity.”

Contributing reviewers: Jocelyn McClurg, Mary Cadden, Brian Truitt, Steph Cha