::READERS REVIEWS::

Darker and Subtler Tale than Christmas Carol - Dickens crafts another dark yet hopeful Christmas tale here. Redlaw is a better developed and subtler character than Ebenezer Scrooge, and his visit with a spirit -- and the results of that visit -- are arguably more heartbreaking. Scrooge learned his lesson by looking in on those people he knew and watching their lives undetected. Redlaw only realizes his mistake once he has inflicted suffering on many more than just himself. There's a clear lesson to the story, but it's a little more interesting than the I found in A Christmas Carol Most everyone knows the importance of being kind to others, but not everyone would think -- or even agree -- that bad memories are an important part of being human.

Dickens's best Christmas novel - Sadly, this Christmas novella is overshadowed (as are the other four) by A Christmas Carol -- which is, no question, a classic.

But I found this book a worthy equal, if not a bit better than Carol, in that the characters are a little more fleshed out, the movement of the story has darker and therefore more dramatic flourishes - while at the same time the comic characters are more complete and take a more central place in the plot. And the `message' is a bit less obvious.

The ghost of the title is far more sinister than Marley and Christmas Future combined!