Sign up for our newsletters to receive our Most Anticipated Books of 2025!

Summary and Reviews of Skipping Christmas by John Grisham

Skipping Christmas by John Grisham

Skipping Christmas

A Fable

by John Grisham
  • Critics' Consensus (3):
  • Readers' Rating (60):
  • First Published:
  • Nov 1, 2001, 176 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Oct 2004, 240 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

Grisham offers a hilarious look at the chaos and frenzy that have become part of our holiday tradition.

Imagine a year without Christmas. No crowded malls, no corny office parties, no fruitcakes, no unwanted presents. That’s just what Luther and Nora Krank have in mind when they decide that, just this once, they’ll skip the holiday altogether. Theirs will be the only house on Hemlock Street without a rooftop Frosty; they won’t be hosting their annual Christmas Eve bash; they aren’t even going to have a tree. They won’t need one, because come December 25 they’re setting sail on a Caribbean cruise. But, as this weary couple is about to discover, skipping Christmas brings enormous consequences--and isn’t half as easy as they’d imagined.

A classic tale for modern times, Skipping Christmas offers a hilarious look at the chaos and frenzy that have become part of our holiday tradition.

Chapter One

The gate was packed with weary travelers, most of them standing and huddled along the walls because the meager allotment of plastic chairs had long since been taken. Every plane that came and went held at least eighty passengers, yet the gate had seats for only a few dozen.

There seemed to be a thousand waiting for the 7 p.m. flight to Miami. They were bundled up and heavily laden, and after fighting the traffic and the check-in and the mobs along the concourse they were subdued, as a whole. It was the Sunday after Thanksgiving, one of the busiest days of the year for air travel, and as they jostled and got pushed farther into the gate many asked themselves, not for the first time, why, exactly, they had chosen this day to fly.

The reasons were varied and irrelevant at the moment. Some tried to smile. Some tried to read, but the crush and the noise made it difficult. Others just stared at the floor and waited. Nearby a skinny black Santa Claus clanged an irksome ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

Daily News (New York)
Slides down as smoothly as eggnog...and it's a lot more fun than a fruitcake.

Amazon.co.uk --Jerry Brotton
Skipping Christmas is Grisham-lite, with none of the serious action or drama of his legal thrillers, but a funny poke at the craziness of Christmas.

Publishers Weekly
The misanthropy in this short novel makes a good antidote to the more cloying Christmas tales, and the book is fun to read. To compare it to Dickens, however, is...humbug.

Reader Reviews

Anaiza

Skipping Christmas
It was a great book!! I HATE reading but this book was REALLY good for me to finish it. It took me a while to finish it because I lost the book and then found it again so yea but when I read it the second time, I read it in like 2 weeks. Overall the...   Read More
Peggie N.

Delightful, Christmas Book
I enjoy reading this book every year! It is short enough and so entertaining. I wasn't a big fan of the movie but highly recommend this story. My son read it for his high school reading list. He is not a reader but liked it enough to finish- and that...   Read More
Cecilia

Great!
This book and the movie are awesome!!!! I give it a TOTAL thumbs up!! I think it is a great book or movie if you want to watch a Christmas Comedy!! I HIGHLY recommend it! especially for kids ages 7 and up! My mom and I LOVE to watch the movie ...   Read More
Maggie

What A Fantastic Novel!!
Fantastic...I have thought of truly skipping Christmas.However, in John Grisham's novel, I gradually realize the true meaning and love this honorable holiday contains...skipping is not as easy as we think!

Write your own review!

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Skipping Christmas, try these:


More books by John Grisham
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes

Books with similar themes


Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $50 for 12 months or $18 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Clear
    Clear
    by Carys Davies
    John Ferguson is a principled man. But when, in 1843, those principles drive him to break from the ...
  • Book Jacket: The Mighty Red
    The Mighty Red
    by Louise Erdrich
    Permit me to break the fourth wall. Like any good reviewer, I aim to analyze a book dispassionately,...
  • Book Jacket: The Demon of Unrest
    The Demon of Unrest
    by Erik Larson
    In the aftermath of the 1860 presidential election, the divided United States began to collapse as ...
  • Book Jacket: Tell Me Everything
    Tell Me Everything
    by Elizabeth Strout
    Elizabeth Strout's Tell Me Everything picks up where her previous book Lucy by the Sea (2022) left ...

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
Babylonia
by Costanza Casati
From the author of the bestselling Clytemnestra comes another intoxicating excursion into ancient history. When kings fall, queens rise.
Book Jacket
The Memory Library
by Kate Storey
Journey through the pages of this heartwarming novel, where hope, friendship and second chances are written in the margins.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Going Home
    by Tom Lamont

    Going Home is a sparkling, funny, bighearted story of family and what happens when three men take charge of a toddler following an unexpected loss.

Book Club Giveaway!
Win My Darling Boy

My Darling Boy by John Dufresne

The story of of a man whose son collapses into addiction and vanishes into the chaotic netherworld of southern Florida.

Enter

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

D T the B O W the B

and be entered to win..