One of the most poignant Christmas stones ever written is Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory" (1966), which is often included in fiction anthologies and included in his collection A Christmas Memory, One Christmas [and] The Thanksgiving Visitor (1996), available from Modern Library.

Charles Dickens was the author of several commercially and critically popular novels. One of his best is The Tale of Two Cities, originally published in 1859. Set against the background of the French Revolution, the story follows the adventures of Sydney Carton, and his eventual self-sacrifice for the sake of his friends. It is also available on CD-ROM from Quiet Vision in 1999.

Published in 1999, Patricia Davis' novel A Midnight Carol chronicles the story of how Dickens' novel came to be: thirty-year-old Charles Dickens, his debts piling up and a fifth child on the way, somehow writes his most popular work.

Daniel...