Writer and performer MIKE ALBO prefers that thinner, Atkins Diet version of Santa who appears in European imagery. His second novel, The Underminer: The Best Friend Who Casually Destroys Your Life (written with his longtime pal Virginia Heffernan), comes out in paperback in spring 2006. Check out his website: www.mikealbo.com.
LOUIS BAYARD finds Christmas the ideal occasion for pondering the sodden wreckage of his past and for repeatedly viewing the Marlo Thomas remake of It’s a Wonderful Life, which he considers to be shamefully undervalued. His most recent novel, Mr. Timothy, was a New York Times Notable Book. His next novel, The Pale Blue Eye, is due out in March 2006.
STANLEY BING is the author of Sun Tzu Was a Sissy: Conquer Your Enemies, Promote Your Friends, and Wage the Real Art of War; Throwing the Elephant: Zen and the Art of Managing Up; and What Would Machiavelli Do? The Ends Justify the Meanness, and he reports on corporate life twice monthly in Fortune magazine. He is a veteran of many corporate holiday parties and is proud of the fact that he has not disgraced himself at one since Christmas 2002, when he didn’t eat enough hors d’oeuvres to offset the effects of that last tumbler of Glenlivet.
ROGER DIRECTOR is a writer-producer living in Santa Monica. His first novel was A Place to Fall. He is at work on a new book. And the most beautiful Christmas he ever had was on the beach in Hawaii, watching the hula to “White Christmas.”
Come Christmastime, VALERIE FRANKEL works part-time for Santa, designing matching bra-and-panty gift sets that are always a hit with the ladies. Her ninth novel, Hex and the Single Girl, comes out in March 2006.
ANNE GIARDINI doesn’t like to complain, but she hasn’t received a memorable Christmas present since she was ten years old. Her novel The Sad Truth About Happiness was published by HarperCollins in the spring of 2005. She is working on another novel, Nicolo Piccolo, when she is not practicing law and the violin in Vancouver.
CYNTHIA KAPLAN is the author of several books, only one of which, Why I’m Like This: True Stories (Morrow, 2002), has been written and published. Her work has appeared in many newspapers, magazines, journals, and anthologies, and she is the co-writer of the film Pipe Dream. Kaplan is also an actress and comedian and performs in the infamous What I Like About Jew Christmas shows at the Knitting Factory, in NewYork City. Her second book is due out soon, or so they say.
MARIAN KEYES spends Christmas worrying that seasonal high winds might take hold of Rudy, her splendid, life-size illuminated reindeer—the envy of the neighborhood—and whisk him off her roof and into someone else’s garden. Her new novel, Anybody Out There?, will be published in summer 2006.
BINNIE KIRSHENBAUM no longer kicks over the Christmas tree intentionally; the last three times were accidents. Her most recent novel, An Almost Perfect Moment (Ecco/ HarperCollins), is out in a paperback edition.
JOHN MARCHESE is the author of Renovations: A Father and Son Rebuild a House and Rediscover Each Other, and is at work on a book about violin making.Since beginning his writing career with the Lubbock [Texas] Avalanche-Journal, he has written for dozens of newspapers and magazines. Though he lives in New York, he spends more time in Texas than is good for him.
CATHERINE NEWMAN is the author of the award-winning memoir Waiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family (Penguin, 2005) and of the child-raising journal Bringing Up Ben & Birdy at BabyCenter.com. She is a contributing editor for FamilyFun magazine, and her work has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies, including in the New York Times bestseller The Bitch in the House (HarperCollins,2002) and Toddler (Seal Press, 2003). She braves the holidays in snowy, hot-cidery, hack-down-your-own-tree-and-love-it Massachusetts.
ELIZABETH NOBLE no longer has time to bitch about having a Christmas birthday (which was how she spent her first thirty Christmas Days). She’s too old, and too busy recreating the magic she remembers from her own mother’s home for her two daughters, Tallulah and Ottilie, who make believing believable. She’s the author of The Reading Group. Her next novel, The Friendship Test, is due out in January2006.
ANN PATCHETT has never put up a Christmas tree and immediately regifts all the ornaments she receives. Her latest book is Truth & Beauty.
NEAL POLLACK, a Bar Mitzvahed son of Abraham, spends his Christmas pretending to enjoy Christmas with his Protestant family-in-law. His memoir, Daddy Was a Sinner, will be published in the fall of 2006.
Successfully deprogrammed parochial-school survivor JONI RODGERS practices a self-important woowoo religion called Jewbuddhistianity but still finds herself craving Tater Tot Hotdish and other exotic Protestant comestibles during Advent. Her fifth book, The Secret Sisters, comes out in spring 2006. For more on all that, visit www.jonirodgers.com.
AMY KROUSE ROSENTHA is the author of Encycopedia of an Ordinary ifeand of severa chidren’s books. She ives in Chicago. This concludes the worst “no L” joke ever.
MITCHELL SYMONS is a Brit who likes Americans— yup, he’s the one—except when they invite him to spend Christmas with them. His latest book is This Book of More Perfectly Useless Information, and in the absence of anyone else doing so, he thoroughly recommends it.
CINTRA WILSON likes to spend Christmas Day going from friend’s house to friend’s house just enjoying all the colorful pills in their medicine cabinets. The paperback of her latest book, Colors Insulting to Nature, was released in June 2005. She is currently at work on a novel purely devoted to the spirit of Christmas, entitled The Yule-Log Archipelago.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.