The Best Holiday Books for Kids of All Ages
Enjoy a relaxing and peaceful afternoon this holiday season with a great book or two or three! Starting a reading list in the winter as the year winds down, is an awesome way to get an early start on New year’s resolution as well as foster a continued love of reading and creativity within your kids! Whether they’re curled up under the tree waiting for Santa’s arrival or stationed next to the window as snow flutters down from the sky, a good holiday book will take them to new worlds and get them into the spirit.
Are you looking for a way to keep your kids entertained during the winter break? Check out 10 Fun Winter Break Camps Offered Around NYC 2021!
Early Readers
The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
All ABOARD! Slip on your slippers, don your nightgown and cap, and hold tight to your golden ticket as you take a magical ride with a young boy through the Christmas Eve night to the North Pole. If the reindeer’s bell still jingles for you, perhaps you will get a Christmas wish, too! Grades Pre-K – Grade 2.
How the Grinch Stole Christmas! by Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel
Introduce or reintroduce your children to this Christmas-time classic from legendary author Dr. Seuss and learn how Christmas was almost ruined by “this mean fellow, with his skin all green and his teeth all yellow.” Grades Pre-K – Grade 2.
The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
SNOW DAY! Rise and shine and explore with a little boy named Peter in this award-winning, classic tale about the adventure and wonderment of a first snowfall. Grades Pre-K – Grade 2.
Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins by Eric A. Kimmel
Since 1989, this award-winning, entertaining, and engaging folktale has been educating young children of the spirit of Hanukkah! Follow along with Hershel of Ostropol on the Eve of Hanukkah, as he attempts to bring the holiday to a small village, but first he’ll have to rid them of eight unwanted guests: goblins! Grades Pre-K – Grade 2.
Together for Kwanzaa by Juwanda G. Ford
Celebrate this African American and Pan-African holiday with young Kayla and her family! Kwanzaa is Kayla’s favorite time of year – from the food, the festivities, and the time with family, but this year it seems her whole family won’t be together for the celebration. Will a snowstorm keep her brother away? Read along and find out! Grades Pre-K – Grade 2.
Upper-Level Books
Christmas Carol & the Defenders of Claus by Robert L. Fouch
What could possibly be the downside of Christmas? Living in a land of snow-less Decembers and your only relative being the personification of the Grinch, might do the trick. This year’s upside, however? Young Carol has been called upon by the man in the red suit himself to assume her birthright as a Defenders of Claus. Read along and find out if Carol is up to the challenge or if Christmas will be no more! Grades 3-7.
Dreidels on the Brain by Joel Ben Izzy
Oy! What a spin! It’s 1971 in “The Land of Shriveled Dreams” or Los Angeles as it’s more commonly known and all aspiring magician 12-year-old Joel is wishing for these eight nights is to be a superhero: Normalman. However, his wish is no small feat. Tag along and learn the value of family, heritage, laughter, and the art of illusion, in this American Hanukkah story! Grades 3-7.
Grade 8th & Young Adult
The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand
In this twist on the classic Scrooge tale, 17-year-old Holly Chase was once visited by three specters of Christmas past, present, and future. Unlike the original Scrooge, though, the message of goodwill and changing one’s ways doesn’t quite sink in for Holly. Her punishment? Become the latest Ghost of Christmas Past. Following along with Holly on numerous Christmas Eve nights as she saves countless miserly grouches and perhaps, eventually, herself. Young Adult.
The Matzah Ball: A Novel by Jean Meltzer
Hanukkah-celebrating, good girl Rachel Rubenstein-Goldblatt has a decades-long secret she’s been keeping from her Jewish family: not only does she love Christmas and all the magic and merriment it entails, she’s also cultivated a career as a Christmas romance novelist! But when her diversity-conscious publisher insists she write a Hanukkah romance, she no longer feels the holiday spirit. Desperate in her quest of inspiration, she attends a Matzah Ball where she runs into her childhood summer camp archnemesis, Jacob Greenberg. Will Jacob help Rachel find the magic of holiday glowing in the menorah candles as well as her heart? Read and find out! Young Adult.
Miracle on 5th Avenue by Sarah Morgan
Hopeless romantic and Christmas enthusiast Eva Jordan thought she would be spending the holidays alone this year, but when she’s given an opportunity to house-sit a Manhattan penthouse on Fifth Avenue, she finds herself snowed-in with its gorgeous, mysterious, and reclusive owner. Bestselling crime writer Lucas Blade is not feeling the Christmas spirit at all as the deadline of his latest book and the anniversary of his wife’s death looming overhead. All he wants for Christmas is zero distractions and not a mistletoe or spring of holly in sight. Enter Eva, a blizzard, and a little Christmas magic and you have the perfect recipe for a Yuletide happily-ever-after! Young Adult.
