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Here are two very special Christmas stories, books that are built on childlike faith but are by no means just for children.
The mystery begins with a dusty old Advent calendar, and like an Advent calendar The Christmas Mystery unfolds in 24 chapters. What a cozy tradition it would be to start this story at the beginning of December and read a chapter a night aloud until Christmas.
Best-selling Norwegian writer Jostein Gaardner tells the story within a story of a young boy who discovers inside that Advent calendar the tale of a young girl -- the mysterious Elisabet who travels back in time to the age of the Nativity. In a season of mystery and miracle, here is a story that captures both.
Flight of the Reindeer. . . Second only to "Is there a Santa Claus?" is the question "Do reindeer really know how to fly?" The answer comes easily and with complete documentation in this very funny, pseudoscientific exploration of the phenomenon known as flying reindeer. The author, in search of the truth about these creatures, digs through old Inuit documents, pieces of leather with flying reindeer etched in them, photographs of blurry things up in the air, and other such whimsically reproduced items.
We are provided with charts of Santa Claus's flight schedule on Christmas Eve, we hear from real-life polar explorer Wil Steger (" 'Did you know,' asks Steger, 'that elves -- or any animals, for that matter -- live much longer at the Pole?' "), and we see the physics of reindeer flight.
All is revealed with a very straight face and an earnestness which makes the book all the more fun.
©1996, ProMotion, inc.
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