Skip to Main Content

UCD Library Collection Spotlight: Christmas 2016

A monthly online and print display highlighting our collections

This Year's Selection

The Christmas Presence

A collection of heartwarming and uplifting stories that will capture the imagination of all those who are young at heart, and unmask the reality of Christmas beyond the tinsel and the turkey.

It's a Wonderful Life

After George Bailey (James Stewart) wishes he had never been born, an angel (Henry Travers) is sent to earth to make George's wish come true. George starts to realize how many lives he has changed and impacted, and how they would be different if he was never there.

Christmas Club

It is 1988 & a motley crew of cynical young urbanites, brought together by a series of strange, thrilling & even dangerous events end up stranded at Christmas in a bleak, run-down house on the isolated Donegal coastline. Fast forward to 2003 & the group are brought back together to celebrate the wedding of two of the original gang.

The Nightmare before Christmas

The film follows the misadventures of Jack Skellington, Halloweentown's beloved pumpkin king, who has become bored with the same annual routine of frightening people in the "real world." 

A Christmas Truce Carol

Historical Fiction, First World War, Ireland, Animals at War. December 24th 1914 and all along the western front soldiers are settling down for a night of disturbed sleep, foraging rats, and the evil attentions of enemy snipers. Suddenly from across No Mans Land comes the sound of singing. not sure at first what is happening the troops look at each other in disbelief and then slowly, slowly, they join in.

Another Family Christmas

The grown ups hope for a Santa who will fulfil their hopes and compensate for their disappointments. But the magic goes hand in hand with innocence, and for the adults, the realisation of their wishes often brings more than they bargained for.

Feast

From the earliest evidence of human consumption around half a million years ago to the era of the TV dinner and the drive-through diner, this fascinating account unfolds the history of the human meal and its huge impact both on human society and the ecology of the planet.

Mother Teresa on Advent and Christmas

This gift book offers a short reflection from Mother Teresa for each of the 30 days of Advent and each of the 12 days of Christmas and a reflection for the feast of the Immaculate Conception.

And...

Some More Titles...

The Dolmen Book of Irish Christmas Stories

The theme of Christmas brings out the best in Ireland's short story writers, as this collection shows. Over 10 stories from some of Ireland's most prominent writers.

Irish Christmas Stories

This is a collection of Irish Christmas stories, including works from John McGaehern, Anne Devlin, Mary Morrissey, William Trevor, Bernard McLaverty and Patrick McCabe, alongside newcomers.

Christmas in Ireland

Christmas in Ireland is a magical time -- a season of tradition and celebration, family and friends, solemn worship and spirited blarney. The book showcases 25 stories, reminiscences, and poems -- many written specifically for this collection -- by 11 of Ireland's brightest literary stars.

The Night Before Christmas

Alice Taylor takes a nostalgic, loving look back to a family firmly rooted in tradition and humour and - in particular - the Christmas traditions of her childhood. With her unerring knack of bringing her readers into her home, her stories of a childhood Christmas are rich, warm and amusing, giving a wonderful insight into life as it was.  

A Christmas Omnibus: The Best of John B. Keane

A bumper collection of Christmas stories by one of Ireland's greatest humorous writers.

Irish Christmas Stories No 2

This Christmas collection of 22 short stories features work by Sean O'Faolain, William Trevor, Elizabeth Bowen, Maeve Binchy, Frank O'Connor, John B. Keane, Colum McCann, Hugo Hamilton, Benedict Kiely, Bernard MacLaverty and Clare Boyland.

A Dublin Christmas

On the day before Christmas Eve, two children, Niamh and Michel Clery, are accidentally separated from their parents while shopping. They discover a passageway down to Santa's wonderland, which unbeknownst to Dubliners, has been under their city streets since the Ice Age slid the entire North Pole south, millions of years earlier.