And so they emerge again, washed up like an unwanted box of Guylian chocolates on the far distant shores of Amazon, Waterstones and the remaining independent bookshops: the seasonal range of novelty books, coffee table books, quirky reference books and the otherwise unclassifiable and unreviewable. How to sort the shiny, pretty things from the dreck and the dross; what to gift, regift and give to yourself?
Coffee table-wise, there is the usual choice, from the likes of Vogue: The Covers (Abrams), which is astonishingly heavy, to Agata Toromanoff’s Couples in Art (Ullmann), which might make a nice ironic gift for an ex, and Chris Roberts’ Beyoncégraphica (Aurum), which is an infographic-style biography of Beyoncé. Outstandingly rare and precious is Polly Devlin’s New York: Places to Write Home About (Pimpernel), a peek into the homes of New York’s super-rich and super-stylish, which includes a surprising number of writers; James Fenton, it turns out, lives in a sort of palace. Mark Cousins’ The Story of Looking (Canongate) I include among these books only because it is difficult to know where else to put it: a wide-ranging history of looking, you will gaze at it in wonder, like a wise man at a star.
This year’s range of culinary stocking fillers goes from the highbrow – Ruth Ball’s Rough Spirits & High Society (British Library) – to the deliciously lowbrow, the lowest point being Action Bronson’s F*ck, That’s Delicious (Abrams), which is based on the sizeable rapper/chef’s popular TV show. Definitely one for the kids. Or your nan.
The toss-up for this year’s best TV tie-in is between Mary Killen and Giles Wood’s The Diary of Two Nobodies (Virgin) and Fred Siriex’s Secret Service: Lifting the Lid on the Restaurant World (Quadrille). The former is an inventive double diary by the weird, posh bohemian ones off Gogglebox, but the latter is the gorgeous, wise, bearded French maître d’ on First Dates, so he wins.
There is no obvious successor to hygge this year, thank goodness. The closest things are probably the various funky craft books, the best of which are Alexander Langland’s improbable Craeft (Faber), which is not a spelling error but rather a learned disquisition on the Anglo-Saxon roots of craft skills, and Sarah Corbett’s How to Be a Craftivist (Unbound), which would make a nice gift for anyone intending both to knit and to wear a balaclava at a demonstration.
Wacky science is covered admirably by Helen Arney and Steve Mould’s The Element in the Room (Octopus), while actual science is the subject of Helen Scales’ 11 Explorations Into Life on Earth (Michael O’Mara), but if you are one of the few people looking for a serious book about Christianity at this time of year – imagine! – that book is by the Muslim, German-Iranian scholar Navid Kermani, whose Wonder Beyond Belief (Polity, translated by Tony Crawford) is a work of genius and unlikely to be reviewed anywhere else, except perhaps the Church Times. Another brilliant, serious-minded oddity is Giorgio van Straten’s In Search of Lost Books: The Forgotten Stories of Eight Mythical Volumes (Pushkin), from the memoirs of Lord Byron to a novel by Sylvia Plath – it is a little masterpiece devoted to overlooked, lost, destroyed and otherwise neglected manuscripts.
As if Christmas itself were not enough, some people like to read books about Christmas at Christmas. Thus there is Judith Flanders’ Christmas: A Biography (Picador), which is exactly what its title suggests, and On Christmas: A Seasonal Anthology (Notting Hill), which is introduced by Gyles Brandreth.
Looking forwards, Lia Leendertz’s The Almanac: A Seasonal Guide to 2018 (Unbound) is an excellent idea – it is literally an almanac – but my copy fell apart by the time I had got to March, which does not bode well. Chuck D’s This Day in Rap and Hip‑Hop History (Octopus), meanwhile, is a book for which many of us have been waiting for years. Was it really on 11 July 1995 that Shaggy released his third album, Boombastic?
As for puzzles, quizzes and games, you might have thought it would have been impossible to top The Monkman and Seagull Quiz Book (Eyewear), by the two blokes off University Challenge, but Alex Bellos’s Puzzle Ninja (Guardian Faber) gives them a run for their money, introducing Sudoku fans to other Japanese puzzle delights.
Also, for the first time, this year there is a widely available Nemo’s Almanac (Profile), the literary puzzle book that was started by a governess called Mrs Larden in 1892, once edited by Alan Hollinghurst, and has been circulating in samizdat form among the cognoscenti for years. Top tip: if in doubt, the answer is probably Ronald Firbank.
Humour is hard to find at this time of year, as always, although there is perhaps no better season to celebrate with Devorah Baum’s The Jewish Joke (Profile). Otherwise, there is The Complete Uxbridge English Dictionary (Windmill), based on I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue, which may or may not be a recommendation.
Parodies were the big thing last year and the trend staggers on, with various spoof Mr Men and Little Miss books, including Little Miss Busy Surviving Motherhood (Egmont). The topical stuff related to Brexit and Trump is utter rubbish, as you might expect, with the exception of The Beautiful Poetry of Donald Trump (Canongate) by Rob Sears, which is basically a book of Trump quote cut‑ups. You would laugh if it were not so sad.
•What have you enjoyed reading in 2017? Send your choices in 150 words or fewer to readers.books@theguardian.com or Readers’ Books of the Year, Review, The Guardian, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU (including address and phone number), to arrive no later than Monday 11 December. Or comment below. We will publish a selection in the paper and online on 30 December.
