Who Needs Christmas? By Joyee Flynn - Reader Guest post - Hells and her Christmas recommendation -

Hells visits my blog with her Christmas Read recommendation...

Thank you Hells... RJ X

Who Needs Christmas?

Christmas holds no joy for me; it was ruined 8 years ago when I started to work in retail. Every year I’m subjected to constant Christmas songs for 9 hours a day, I witness usually lovely people turn awful while rushing to get the best presents and those cute little children turn into brats.

I started to avoid anything Christmas themed including books because real life Christmas was an even bigger disappointment after reading the wonderful endings most Christmas themed books have.

That was until 2012 when a new series based on Christmas caught my attention. A group of twelve elves left the North Pole to be free of all things Christmas and have been living together for decades. All this time they have gone without finding their mates, but when the first of the twelve finds his, the rest have hope for themselves.

For the 12 days of Christmas Joyee Flynn released a book about her kinky elves who hated Christmas. Unable to resist I bought the first one, Screw Santa. Now these books aren’t for everyone, they are a bit of fun and a simple easy read. If you're looking for light entertainment, a lot of humor and poking fun at existing elf and Christmas legends this could be for you.

The titles of the books alone make me laugh, Stripe My Pole and Flush The Twinkles always make me giggle. After reading the first I liked it enough to read the second, then the third and so on till I finished the series. For the first time in years I enjoyed something Christmas themed.

I love the humour in these books, it reminds me of the joy and fun that Christmas can be. The Elves all have their own reasons for hating Christmas which do add to the plot of the books but to me the aim is to show that Christmas is what you make of it. Spending time with family and friends is what’s important and that Christmas is a time when that’s possible.

The next year as Christmas came around again, feeling like it arrives earlier and earlier, I started my usual Bah Humbug attitude. The Christmas decorations started going up just after Halloween, the stores started getting the early Christmas themed gifts in and the Toy adverts on the TV started taking over.

Looking through my e-reader for my next re-read I came across the Who Needs Christmas folder and I remembered the fun I had reading them the year before. Memories of sitting on my lunch at work and laughing out loud like a crazy person making my day better flooded me and I knew I would be reading them again.

Now I had something to look forward to, I eagerly counted down the days till the day I could start. The books became my Advent Calendar getting to read one each day on the run up to Christmas Day. The second reading was like the first, I loved every minute of these books and they never failed to put a smile on my face.

Now its 2014 and its November, the Christmas decorations are up, the adverts are playing on the TV and I’ve heard my first Christmas song. I’m already Bah Humbuging, I ordered all my Christmas presents online, they’ve been delivered and are in there hiding places so I have no need to shop in December at all. I scowl at every twinkle light I see and growl when asked if I want gingerbread in my Latte at the coffee shop.

The only thing I’m looking forward to is my now Christmas tradition of re-reading my Elves who hate Christmas. The date is marked in my diary and I’ve made sure there already loaded on my ereader, the countdown has begun.

Who Needs Christmas? By Joyee Flynn

Amazon link

1. Screw Santa
2. Hell’s Bells
3. Stupid Mistletoe
4. Holy Stockings
5. Down With The Tunes
6. Frosty Melt
7. Shove Your Tree
8. Stripe My Pole
9. Bite My Cookies
10. Flush The Twinkles
11. Hanging Antlers
12. Wrap It Up