Author Les Standiford delves into the story of one of the most ubiquitous tales in Western culture in The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens's 'A Christmas Carol' Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. Beginning with Dickens' own impoverished childhood, Standiford chronicles the writers' ascent to stardom and fall to near bankruptcy at the time of his penning A Christmas Carol in 1843. With his story of the miserly Scrooge, Dickens was able to turn his career around and ignite a public sentimentality that had been long missing from the Christmas holiday (along with a massive increase in turkey sales).

Be sure to also check out some of Oxford's movie adaptations of Dickens' classic. HM