The Secret Santa Book Swap has been a beloved book club tradition since its inception three years ago. This holiday season, we continued the tradition and spread book enthusiasm and holiday spirit.
For this term’s December session, all fifteen participants selected a book that they have read and wanted somebody else to enjoy, too. The books were brought wrapped in paper, with only written teasers hinting at their contents, genre, and time period. After all teasers had been read, book after book found its new owner—some without much competition, some by a draw of “Ho ho ho” versus “No no no” lottery tickets. The cerimonious unwrapping was a feast of surprised reactions, expressed love for the book favourites, and joyful anticipation of the upcoming holiday reading.
And this year’s unexpected gag was that not only one, but two book club members had brought Normal People by Sally Rooney and nobody caught onto the doubling until the second copy’s unwrapping—that is how intriguing but cryptic the teasers are written.
These books were entered into the Secret Santa Book Swap 2024:
- Carol by Patricia Highsmith
- Cinder by Marissa Meyer
- Dead Poets Society by Nancy H. Kleinbaum
- Genesis by Bernard Beckett
- Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood
- Normal People by Sally Rooney, once
- Normal People by Sally Rooney, twice
- Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
- Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston
- Royal Blood by Aimée Carter
- The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence
- The Foxhole Court by Nora Sakavic
- The Scapegracers by Hannah Abigail Clarke
- The Sword of Kaigen by M. L. Wang
- The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
PADERBORN2READ—The English Book Club wishes happy holidays and happy reading to everybody! While many things in this world are currently far from happiness, with people living through war and politics leaning increasingly right, stories have the power to show us different worlds, to let us dream, and to let us hope. ✨