Secrets of a Christmas Box | Book Review and Giveaway
August 31, 2009 by admin - Jennifer
Filed under Giveaways
From the start of December, to Christmas Eve night, one chapter an evening, Wrapped up with delight.
Enter the magical festive world of the Christmas “Tree-Dwellers”, as Larry, a Christmas snowman, wakes up after a long sleep in the Christmas box, to find his brother missing.
Desperate to find him before Christmas, Larry, along with his girlfriend Debbie, a newcomer Splint, and Larry’s companion Tinsel, break the laws of the “Tree-Elders” and escape down the tree an away into the house, to look for clues.
Away from the safety of the tree and in an unfamiliar world, the Dwellers stumble upon a dark and sinister secret that threatens their entire world. Can Larry and the group make it back to the tree in time to warn the others, and finally uncover the truth behind the “Secrets of a Christmas Box”?
Steven Hornby is a multi award winning animator, bringing stories to life for over 15 years in visual effects and animated movies. Born in Preston, England, he attended Lancaster University for Design Communication for 3 years, which although had nothing to do with animation or telling wonderful stories, introduced him to the world of computer graphics.
In 2000, after working on a set of commercials in Europe and Australasia, and his own short film, “Zzz Night”, he joined the animation crew on the Academy Award winning “The Lord of the Rings” films in New Zealand, which is where he received a VES Award for his animation on J.R.R. Tolkien’s fictional character, Gollum.
Since then, he has been busy as a lead animator on “I, Robot” (2004), “King Kong” (2005), Disney’s “Meet the Robinson’s” (2007) and “Glago’s Guest” (2008), and more recently Dreamworks’s “Kung Fu Panda” (2008) and “How to Train Your Dragon” (In Theaters 2010).
This brings us nicely to the present, where after 3 years of writing, he has just completed the children’s fantasy novel, “Secrets of a Christmas Box” to be released in September 2009. He initially planned the book as a screenplay, after spending several years having the story running around in his head, but instead turned it into his first children’s novel.
Aside from the busy hours at Dreamworks Animation, he has already begun work on the sequel to the Christmas novel, and also a new fantasy adventure, “The Mist Catchers”.
He currently lives in Burbank, California, with his wonderful family.
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This book is a pure delight, and one that seemed to reach deep within me and pull my childhood out as I was captured by the great characters and their quest to save their world. As I was going through chapter by chapter I realized just how much my children would love this story, so I will be taking the advice of the author and at the start of December start reading a chapter a night. I am so excited to bring this particular story to them as the Christmas season is my favorite and is the only season that truly make me feel like a kid again, and this book helps me hold on to that.
I am very happy to be able to host this particular giveaway, as I would love to be able to help one of my readers to feel like a kid again even if for only a moment. I would highly recommend you reading this to your children too as I will be in December. I love books and reading and this is one amazing journey to share. So if you would like to win a Special Edition “Secrets of a Christmas Box” prize package (as shown below) please see the rules to enter today!
Special Edition Prize Package includes: •A specially numbered, signed copy of the book •A set of limited edition stickers •’Secrets of a Christmas Box’ balloons •’Secrets of a Christmas Box’ postcards •’Secrets of a Christmas Box’ pencils
Giveaway
- MAIN RULE – Tell me in comments what your fondest Christmas memory is. (remember if this rule is not followed then no others will count)
- 1 Extra Entry – Subscribe to my RSS feed or by email (or let me know if you already are) in a separate comment
- 1 Extra Entry – Favorite The Dirty Shirt in Technorati and leave your name (I will be checking) in a separate comment
- 1 Extra Entry – Follow me on Twitter (button in subscribe section on on the right sidebar) and let me know your Twitter name in a separate comment.
- 1 Extra Entry – Tweet this giveaway. Copy and paste – @Jentifa is giving away a Secrets of a Christmas Box Special Edition Prize Pack! Check it out here http://tinyurl.com/l9twww. Then come back and leave the direct link to your tweet (go to your twitter account, click on the words when your tweet was sent (ie. 5 seconds ago) and copy and paste that link in comments.
- 1 Extra Entry – Fan Secrets of a Christmas Box on Facebook.
- 2 Extra Entries – Write a post on your blog linking to my blog.
This giveaway will run through midnight on September 14, with winner being announced the morning of September 15. Winner will be chosen using Random.org from all valid entries and notified via email. Winner will have 48 hours to contact me before another winner is chosen. Giveaway is open to U.S. residents only.
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I think one of my fondest is our eldest daughter’s first Christmas. We wanted it to be so special. We were poor and had to start collecting our own Christmas decorations and stuff. My husband and I made homemade pompom balls to hang on our first tree as well as many other things around the house like popcorn garland. We even sold a special quilt made by my mother to help buy more decorations and presents for her. I sometimes regret selling that quilt and I have never told my mom that I don’t own it any longer. But, we had a wonderful Christmas with our first child and that’s what made it special. Thanks,
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My fondest Christmas memory is spending Christmas at an extended Italian family’s home. They are my mom and dad’s friends. Living the traditions, eating the specialty foods, and being considered part of the family was unbelievable.
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I subscribe via email. Oh, and I forgot to leave my email addy on my last entry.
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My fondest memory is finding our stockings full of fun stuff==it was almost as much fun as the big presents
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My fondest Christmas memory is getting together with friends and family every year on Christmas Eve.
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My fondest memories as a kid was sneaking up in the middle of the night an playing with my Christmas toys while everyone else was asleep,then going back to bed an not being surprised the next morning,I did that for several years before I was caught!lol
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My fondest memory is when I was little and my grandparents had the entire large family together. They hired a Santa to visit us and pass out 1 X-mas present present on X-mas Eve. We thought that was pretty exciting. Thanks for the wonderful giveaway.
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My fondest memories are the big family Christmas’s we always have… so I guess it’s and on-going fondest memory! Christmas, to me, is family and faith.
Thank you for the chance to win this lovely prize pack. I think this book looks charming and I’d love to read it!
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My fondest Christmas Memory was spending time with my parents my sisters singing carols, cooking together, telling the story of Christ’s birth, and surprising each other with homemade gifts.
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My fondest Christmas memory was the year before my grandma passed away when we were all together—Christmas was never the same after we lost her. She worked at the A&P and made very little money, yet she saved up all year and had tons of presents for her grandchildren. I didn’t think much about the economics of it back then—-but I sure do appreciate her generosity now.
This was a nice question for a contest entry—thanks for making us think about our past. =) It was also so nice to read the memories of the others.
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My fondest Christmas memory is making the rounds to all the houses on Christmas Eve for gifts then looking for the Christmas Star- I would always find it! I just believed it was the brightest and biggest and most twinkling in the sky!
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My fondest childhood memory: My parents would put us all to bed (4 of us) and my parents and grandparents would set up the tree. When they were finished, they would go outside and ring bells…to us it was Santa’s bells waking us up. We would wake up and open presents “after Santa came” (probably around 3:00 am). It was nice because my grandparents were still there. How magical it was…we would go to bed and while we were sleeping, Santa would come and set up the tree and leave presents!
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I loved looking out the window on Christmas Day just waiting for Santa and one of his elves to arrive (my uncle and aunt). And that came to an end after my brother screamed for two years in a row – that’s how we found out he didn’t like costumes as a toddler!
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My fondest memories are of my son waiting patiently to open gifts til I got up (at 5 or 6 am)
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when we traveled to my Grandmothers-who we didn’t get to see very often because she lived too far away
Wow there are so many. It was prolly when my daughter(my oldest) who is now 18 opened all of her presents 2 weeks before Christmas one year. She was only like 3 or 4. I had wrapped everything one evening after she had gone to bed and decided to put them all under the tree(love a tree w/ tons of presents under it!) not remembering that once she had asked when would she know that Santa had came. I had told her you will know because there will be a bunch of presents under the tree. Well she took that and ran w/ it the next morning when she got up and decided he must of been there and opened them all up! Needless to say we had an early Christmas that year! lol
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my best Christmas memory is my first Christmas with my son.
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My favorite Christmas memory is my mother’s last Christmas with us. I was 12 years old and she was dying from Cancer. When we headed to the living room at 8:00 p.m. My mother was sitting up in her hospital bed coming out of a coma to enjoy Christmas with us. We did it that night, everyone amazed, shocked and happy that she had woken to watch us open gifts. And open we did. The gift opening went on until 11:00 that night. The living room was swimming in gifts and everyone was happy. There aren’t many photos of that holiday none that I can recall but I will always remember it.
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My fondest Christmas memory is when all of us kids got parakeets for Christmas
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Twitter: sleatham1
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My fondest Christmas memory has to be of my brother and me waking up at 3am and going downstairs to see if Santa had visited. We found our gifts and started playing quietly with our stocking goodies…well, our idea of quiet was not…We woke our parents, but they we’re not mad. We made them laugh because we were whispering to eachother while shooting pingpong balls(which made lots of noise) So, at least we were trying!
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I Love Christmas, I think my best memory was last Christmas, it was my daughter’s first and I loved being able to spend the time with her.
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Twitter: coloradomommy
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My fondest Christmas memory would be fairly recently, when a very dear friend of mine made it possible for my family to spend Christmas Eve with hubby’s brother and our niece. It was something that had been missing for a long time in our life and I can never repay her for giving it back to us.
Great looking book, thanks for the chance to win it!
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Twitter: moziesme
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I would love to read this with my daughter! As 1 of 5 kids, we didn’t have a lot growing up – I remember going shopping the day after Christmas when everything was on sale, and then we’d celebrate “our” Christmas the next day; getting Christmas trees on Christmas eve when they were at rock bottom prices; etc. And we would always have hot chocolate and oranges on Christmas morning.
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my fondest Christmas memory is waking up in the early morning Christmas morning and sneaking down to the Christmas tree and finding my ride on horse under there, I think I was 4
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My fondest memory will always be my Dad getting out the big Bible and reading the Christmas story. We always do this before we open gifts.
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I remember when my son Danny was opening his gifts and was so happy,he looked up and said”Thank you Santa Claus”. It was the sweetest
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Twitter: sgrant2005
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My favorite Christmas memory is my sister and I would try to stay up all night on Chritstmas Eve and wait by the fireplace for Santa but we would always wake up the next mornings in our own beds, but we tried so hard to stay awake.
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My best memory if the X-mas my mom got me a puppy
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My fondest Christmas memory was when I surprised my girls with a trip to Disney and we woke up Christmas morning in the Happiest Place on Earth.
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Twitter: rebeccacruz7
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My fondest memory of Christmas is definitely the times my ENTIRE family, cousins, sisters, etc. were together. We cooked up a storm in the kitchen with each of us on teams to be in charge of certain meals, baking fresh cookies, and singing (oh boy was there singing in Spanish). My grandfather had the most beautiful voice and he danced and sang with his grandchildren ALWAYS. He made Christmas so much more memorable. Then ofcourse, was the laughter and joy in everyones faces because we were just a HAPPY GANG.. I definitely miss those days!!
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