Customer Reviews

The Book of the Year: A Brief History of Our Seasonal Holidays

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Aveni had a great opportunity, and he blew it with inconsistent delivery and narcissistic self-reference. This might be a fine book if entitled "A Professor Ruminates on Holidays". However, huge digressions into his personal experiences of solstice ceremonies in Latin America, for example, spoil the narrative rhythm and the scholarly tone.

I expected a soundly researched chronological history of major seasonal holidays, with their sources, evolution, and traditions clearly articulated. If you want that too, don't buy the book.

Instead, this is an interesting series of essays, with too-poor documentation, that pique the reader's interest in holidays but leaves him unsatisfied.