A Christmas book with your child as the hero

In an ordinary Christmas book a child watches someone else have an adventure. In this one they are the person who gets the sleigh going again, and that changes how they listen. The name runs through the whole story rather than sitting on page one, and if you upload a photo the main character on the illustrations really does look like them.

That it works is not a sales line, it is something you notice at home straight away. A child who recognises themselves in a story listens for longer and asks for it again. Why that happens is set out in our piece on a child seeing themselves in a book.

These stories are not only about presents. One is about an empty chair at the table, one about a village that loses its power on Christmas Eve and solves it with candles, and one about the last house of the night where somebody cannot sleep. Christmas Eve, the stocking by the chimney and the morning of the 25th all show up where they belong.

You pick a storyline here, but nothing is fixed. In the form it is simply text you can edit or replace entirely, and Father Christmas, Nova and Pip can be removed or joined by brothers, sisters, grandparents or the dog. If you want something completely different, start with an empty story field and write it yourself.

The book takes about half an hour to make and you see it immediately in a free preview: the complete book, page by page. Only when it is right does it go to print, as a premium hardcover of 21 by 21 cm on heavy paper, delivered within eight working days. If it is not what you hoped for, you simply do not order it.

Which ages it suits: roughly 2 to 8. For the youngest we keep sentences short and the scenes calm; for a six or seven year old something can genuinely go wrong before it comes good. You enter the age when you make the book and the text length moves with it. There is more about that on our page about a gift for a five year old.