Chrissy’s Review: The Girl Who Saved Christmas by Matt Haig

The Girl Who Saved Christmas 
written by Matt Haig
published by Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2017

find it here: (affiliate links) Barnes & Noble, Amazon, iBooks, Target, Walmart, Book Depository, Goodreads

Did I enjoy this book? I did enjoy this book. After I finished A Boy Called Christmas (you can read my review here), I couldn’t wait to start The Girl Who Saved Christmas.

This book continues Father Christmas’s story with Amelia Wishart’s story. Amelia was the first child to receive presents from Father Christmas. She had the most hope of all the children in the world, but her hope fades after her mother dies. This story is sad, more so than A Boy Who Saved Christmas, and you definitely pull for Amelia to have a happy ending. But you hope for the characters, and hope is what’s needed for Christmas. There is also a pretty big incident with the trolls; a story that Noosh is assigned on Christmas Eve.

This story has it all: magic, adventure, elves, trolls, pixies, and a little girl who needs to be saved and who needs to do the saving. The illustrations are fantastic and add to the enjoyment of the story.

Overall, another great Christmas read from Mr. Haig. I hope there’s a third book in this series!

 

Would I recommend it? Absolutely! Be sure to read A Boy Called Christmas first!

 

About the book – from Goodreads: From the bestselling author of A Boy Called Christmas comes a hilarious and heartwarming holiday tale for fans of Roald Dahl and Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol that imagines the story of the first child to ever receive a Christmas present.

“Matt Haig has an empathy for the human condition, the light and the dark of it, and he uses the full palette to build his excellent stories.” –Neil Gaiman, Newbery-winning author of The Graveyard Book

Amelia Wishart was the first child ever to receive a Christmas present. It was her Christmas spirit that gave Santa the extra boost of magic he needed to make his first trip around the world. But now Amelia is in trouble.

When her mother falls ill, she is sent to the workhouse to toil under cruel Mr. Creeper. For a whole year, Amelia scrubs the floors and eats watery gruel, without a whiff of kindness to keep her going. It’s not long before her hope begins to drain away.

Meanwhile, up at the North Pole, magic levels dip dangerously low as Christmas approaches, and Santa knows that something is gravely wrong. With the help of his trusty reindeer, a curious cat, and Charles Dickens, he sets out to find Amelia, the only girl who might be able to save Christmas. But first Amelia must learn to believe again. . . .