Customer Reviews

A Christmas Carol and Other Stories (Modern Library)

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I really enjoy the Modern Library Classics...they are well made books, nice size (not a pocket paperback). They have nice introductions.

This review is specific to the Modern Library hardback. You probably know "A Christmas Carol," but you may not be familiar with "The Chimes" or "The Haunted Man."

According to the introduction, Charles Dickens wrote a Christmas story every year after the success of "A Christmas Carol." This edition includes two of those tales as well. If you are a Dickens, or 19th century English literature, fan, you will probably enjoy those stories. Noticeably missing from the book is "Cricket on the Hearth."

Overall, the book has nice paper, text, and a great little biographical introduction. I will definitely look for more Modern Library titles.

Overall, A Christmas Carol was a great book which would not be possible if Charles Dickens is not a wonderful author. Out of all of the books I have read, A Christmas Carol has the most details told in the most exciting format. Charles Dickens makes this book interesting because he does not have a paragraph in the beginning of the book that tells all of the details about each character, he gives clues to the reader about each of the characters and about the setting. Many authors today like to state information about each character, so by the time you are finished reading about all of the characters in the book, you would forget about each one of them because reading all of the details about each character gets boring after a while. The fifty page rule is not needed for this book. The fifty page rule states that you should read up to page fifty in a book, and if the book does not interest you, then you can quit reading it and switch to another book that interests you.
Since Dickens does a wonderful job in giving the reader all of the details, the characters are easy to relate to. There is the main character named Scrooge. There is Bob Cratchit, who is Scrooge's secretary. Then, there are the four ghosts: the ghost of Jacob Marley, Scrooge's dead partner in business; the ghost of Christmas past; the ghost of Christmas present; and the ghost of Christmas future. In the story, Scrooge is a grumpy old miser who does not care about anybody except himself. So, every time a charity has an annual donation at Christmas, Scrooge would not donate a penny. Because of his selfish behavior, the ghost of Jacob Marley, who was also a miser when he was alive, came to Scrooge and told him to change. But, Scrooge did not listen to the ghost of Marley, so Marley sent the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future to help Scrooge change. Throughout the story, the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future take Scrooge to certain time periods from when he was a little boy to a deceased old man and each visit makes Scrooge more willing to change his selfish ways. At the end of the story, Scrooge returns home from his journeys and promises the ghosts that he will change.
I think that this book should be read in schools, because the moral of this story needs to be in every person's daily life. It is also a good book to be read in schools because Charles Dickens has a great writing technique that would be useful to learn. This book also has a great story line. I do not think that any person would get bored while reading this book. Charles Dickens came up with a really good story line that is very exciting because of how Dickens presents the characters. I wish I was as talented as Dickens in coming up with such a perfect story line. This is definitely a book that everyone should read.

In the spirit of the holidays, I thought I'd pick up this novel because like most people, I have seen the film before I read the book and enjoyed the movie immensely, and I am a fan of Dickens' other writings (i.e. Great Expectations, David Copperfield). With that said, I knew what the novel was about and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I am suprised to see how the movie adapted itself so closely to the original story (most movies adapted from novels can be so different than the book), and I was suprised to see how short the novel was (you can pretty much finish the novel as quickly as you could watch the movie-- perhaps even faster!) Anyway, the only difference is that in the novel Scrooge never visits the Cratchits. That's the only thing Hollywood did to make the audience feel even better. It's a great read; one I'd recommend to read to a child before bedtime during the Holiday season (a few pages at a time over a few days or weeks of course, the novel isn't THAT short.)
As a bonus, The Chimes and The Haunted Man (more holiday short stories) are included in this book. They are similar in the structure of A Christmas Carol, but are not as universally touching nor are they as well written. The Chimes is particular in its story concerning the poor and wretched in England, and the Haunted Man was just vague and hard to read. You don't get nearly as attached to the characters in either of these short stories so if you're getting the book for A Christmas Carol, it's likely you will not enjoy the other stories. If you are a Dickens fan, you'll most likely read them and judge for yourself.