For anyone who wants a book that, in the most subtle way, celebrates what matters most at Christmas good will on earth and peace among men but without a sermon, snowflake or even stray tinsel in sight, Mirror, by Jeannie Baker (Walker £12.99), is the season's most remarkable book. It comes as no surprise to learn it has been years in the making. Baker's original and brilliantly executed idea is to tell a story in English and Arabic on facing pages about two families: Australian (to the left); Moroccan (to the right).
A series of exquisitely accurate and compendious collages unfolds, beginning with a double dawn. A family wakes in Australia a boy stirs, a baby luxuriously stretches a primrose leg. At the same moment in time, a Moroccan woman is on her knees praying. One moon shines on both. A Moroccan carpet magical in a homespun sense links the two worlds, woven in one country, sold in another. A book of reflections in every sense (ages 4+).
There's Going to Be a Baby by John Burningham and Helen Oxenbury (Walker £12.99) is required reading for anyone expecting a second baby. Burningham and Oxenbury are married but have never collaborated on a book until now. Burningham is in charge of words, Oxenbury illustrates. Their book sympathetically embraces, and starts the process of defusing, the anxieties of a toddler about a forthcoming usurper. It considers the jobs the baby might one day undertake and the toddler imagines with satisfaction the hash the baby would make of its assorted occupations (taken to gleeful extremes by Oxenbury). The last sobering page is impressively truthful. The boy is pictured walking towards the hospital door, asking his grandad uncertainly: "We're going to love the baby, aren't we?" (2+).
Everyone knows how irritating a younger tagger-on sibling can be, and there are times, in Lauren Child's Slightly Invisible (Orchard £10.99) when Lola is a nuisance. Charlie and his friend Marv come up with a stratagem, an invisibility potion "made from pink milk, a tiny drop of banana and a secret invisible ingredient that no one can see except us", so they can play unmolested. But one look at Lola's pert, watchful face under the table tells us she will not give up easily. She employs her own invisible friend, Soren Lorensen, who turns out to be a formidable ally. The Child recipe at its fresh, playful best (3+).
For those who want a book that directly alludes to Christmas, there is one outstanding contender: The Christmas Eve Ghost by Shirley Hughes (Walker £12.99). This is a departure for Hughes, who has gone back to her childhood city of Liverpool to tell this ambitious story set in the 1930s. It is, in its sympathetic way, a social history and a marvellous evocation of the period. It describes the widow of a Welsh miner taking in laundry to support her children. Times are hard. And it does not neglect to show us a line of unemployed men, hands in pockets. As to the Christmas Eve ghost well, no one need get too frightened (4+).
Meg Goes to Bed by Helen Nicoll and Jan Pienkowski (Puffin £5.99) is a welcome return, after several years, of the unreliable witch who, with her cat and pet owl, turns out to be a devilish cook the sort of spell-maker you would not want helping with Christmas lunch. Her pasta turns into worm stew and wriggles away. But her pancakes fortunately, if not altogether convincingly, save the day and there is a blissful illustration of pancake-making in a cauldron: "You find milk and I'll find flour/ And we'll have pancakes/ In half an hour" (2+).
The Story of the World's Greatest Paintings by Charlie Ayres (Thames & Hudson £9.99) is a picture book about pictures 20 of the world's greatest masterpieces to be precise and would make a great present. Ayres has approached the task with zest and the result is rich, interactive and engaging. The book is also marvellously informative including curious details about the personal lives of artists. I did not know that Vermeer had 15 children and fretted about money, nor that Botticelli was uncompromisingly undomestic. He never married the idea gave him nightmares (11+).
