Your Holiday Greetings Solution
 

This is just about the time of year that my my mom would put together a Christmas letter and start stuffing a copy into each of the stack of Christmas cards she got at the local Hallmark store or had made at the local Photomat. My dad would pull out his big list of names and addresses--yes, he kept track of every card sent and received--and start addressing envelopes. Then, after a brief stop at the US Post Office for holiday stamps, the cards would be signed, stuffed, sealed, and stamped, then carried back to the local Post Office. A holiday tradition, to be sure, but also a hassle and an expense. And, of course, you just can't skip the exchange of greetings or send a simple email (you know, those things that were longer and better punctuated than texts), lest you look cheap and curmudgeonly.

Years ago, my experience with getting and giving critiques with my local writers' group and the confluence of NaNoWriMo with the holiday season inspired me to write a short tale which answered the question of what might happen if the simple holiday songs we all know and love were submitted as short stories to a writing critique service. I read it at a holiday gathering and followed up in subsequent years with new critques of dfferent holiday songs. I also published them as individual stories on Amazon, including Kindle Unlimited. Eventually, I combined all four of them into a single collection.

I confess, I've always thought that sending one of these stories to friends, colleagues, and second cousins is a great alternative to sending holiday cards. Cheaper (at 99 cents) by far than physical cards and postage, less arduous and narcissistic than a holiday letter, fancier than a simple email or text, and easy to send by gift electronically (with a short personalized message) via Amazon, you can take care of your entire holiday card list in a very, very short time. Besides, they're fun and funny. You can send out a different one each year or mix and match the song being spoofed to target the taste of the recipient. As part of my TikTok experiment, I even produced a video suggesting just this. You can find it on my TikTok or Facebook Reels @donaldjbingle.

Season's Critiquings parodies and critiques Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

Merry Mark-Up takes on the darker tale of Frosty, the Snowman.

Holiday Workshopping deals with the romantic tension of Let it Snow.

Santa Clauses and Phrases delves into the mystery at the core of Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.

If you want to be especially nice to that special someone (as well as me), you can get all four stories in my Christmas Carol Critique Collection for less than three bucks. Sample them all by grabbing copies for yourself via your Kindle Unlimited subscription. And, as my special Christmas card to you all, click here to link to a video of me reading the first in the series a decade ago (go to 1:28 if you want to skip the introduction).

Yep, I know the pic above only has three out of the four covers, but Amazon photos of series generally only include three covers--can't say why.

Being nice is freakin’ hard…

A Goth-elf, Jack is not like most other elves at The Pole. He hates the cold. Hates making toys. And he thinks Santa might be just a little bit too stingy with the coal.

Afraid he might belong to a darker side of Christmas, Jack dreams of running away while Santa is out delivering presents. He steals the Naughty List, planning to use it as a map to find his Christmas demon idol, Krampus, who travels the world Christmas Eve to punish all the Naughty Children.

But Jack’s dream sets him on an adventure that turns nightmarish. Using Goth-kids as bait, Jack finally meets his idol and discovers that he is on Krampus’ Naughty List. And Krampus doesn't play nice. At all. As a matter of fact, Krampus is downright evil…attacking Santa and dragging Jack’s kinda-sorta girlfriend, Candi, into the underworld. Can Jack rescue them and the Naughty Children in time to save Christmas?

If he pulls it off, Jack just might get a Christmas surprise bigger than anything he could have ever wished for. But as he would say, this holiday is just…so…extra.

Bad Elf and The Krampus is a humorous Yuletide tale. If you enjoy unlikely heroes, wild rides, and a splash of dark fun, then you’ll love John Rae’s rollicking adventure.

Buy Bad Elf and The Krampus today, or you just might end up on Krampus’ Naughty list!

The Love-Haight Case Files, Omni Edition of Books 1 & 2

The omni version of The Love-Haight Case Files is now available. With all eight cases from Books 1 and 2 in one volume, the omni edition is one impressively long book. You can get the ebook here. And, just like the separate volumes, Kindle Unlimited subscribers can download for free. You can even get the omni version in an impressively hefty, 794-page print version here.

Donald J. Bingle is the author of seven books and more than sixty shorter works in the horror, thriller, science fiction, mystery, fantasy, steampunk, romance, comedy, and memoir genres. His books include Forced Conversion (near future military scifi), GREENSWORD (darkly comedic eco-thriller), Frame Shop (murder in a suburban writers' group), and the Dick Thornby spy thriller series (Net Impact, Wet Work, and Flash Drive). He also co-authored (with Jean Rabe) The Love-Haight Case Files series (a three-time Silver Falchion winning paranormal urban fantasy about two lawyers who represent the legal rights of supernatural creatures in a magic-filled San Francisco; Book 2 just came out). Don also edited Familiar Spirits (an anthology of ghost stories).

Many of Don's shorter works can be found in his Writer on Demand TM collections.

Get the audiobook version of Net Impact at Audible.com, Amazon, and iTunes and the audiobook version of Wet Work at Audible.com, Amazon, and iTunes.

Full disclosure: Various links in my newsletter or on my website may include Amazon Affiliate coding, which gets me a small referral fee (at no cost to you) if you purchase after clicking through.