What do you think?
Rate this book
A Christmas Carol in Rhyme
Snow falls on London, candles flicker, and a miser hears midnight chimes that change his life. This retelling sings in quick, rhyming lines that carry readers from laughter at a cranky old man to the hush of a haunted bedroom and the joy of a crowded Christmas table. The language is clear and lively, perfect for reading aloud, with pictures that glow like windows on a winter street. Expect carols, clatter, and wonder, all paced for young listeners and engaging for older eyes.
Three visitors arrive with lessons that feel close to home. The first opens doors to yesterday, the second warms the present with food, family, and games, and the last points to a road no one wants to take. Along the way, kindness, gratitude, and courage move from ideas to actions you can see and feel. Humor softens the sharp parts, and the ending lands like a bell, bright and true.
Designed for ages 7 to 97, this is a cozy read and a rich companion for holiday gatherings. Repeating refrains invite children to chime in, while clever details give teens and adults plenty to notice on each reread. Open the covers to find a classic made fresh, a winter city painted in color, and a story that leaves the room warmer than it found it.
Three visitors arrive with lessons that feel close to home. The first opens doors to yesterday, the second warms the present with food, family, and games, and the last points to a road no one wants to take. Along the way, kindness, gratitude, and courage move from ideas to actions you can see and feel. Humor softens the sharp parts, and the ending lands like a bell, bright and true.
Designed for ages 7 to 97, this is a cozy read and a rich companion for holiday gatherings. Repeating refrains invite children to chime in, while clever details give teens and adults plenty to notice on each reread. Open the covers to find a classic made fresh, a winter city painted in color, and a story that leaves the room warmer than it found it.
151 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 13, 2025
22 people are currently reading
675 people want to read
About the author
Samuel DenHartog
322 books113 followersSamuel DenHartog is a versatile and imaginative author whose works span a wide array of genres, including mythology, fables, fairy tales, fantasy, romance, mystery, science fiction, and children's books. His stories captivate readers of all ages, blending wonder with rich, timeless narratives.
What sets Samuel apart is his ability to breathe new life into ancient tales while preserving their core essence. Whether it's mythology, folklore, or fairy tales from various cultures, by carefully balancing tradition with modern touches, he creates stories that resonate with contemporary audiences, making historical and mythical narratives feel fresh, relevant, and engaging.
Off the page, Samuel is a lifelong learner, constantly expanding his creative horizons and engaging with innovative ideas. His journey is a continual pursuit of knowledge and creativity, bridging the worlds of tradition and imagination.
What sets Samuel apart is his ability to breathe new life into ancient tales while preserving their core essence. Whether it's mythology, folklore, or fairy tales from various cultures, by carefully balancing tradition with modern touches, he creates stories that resonate with contemporary audiences, making historical and mythical narratives feel fresh, relevant, and engaging.
Off the page, Samuel is a lifelong learner, constantly expanding his creative horizons and engaging with innovative ideas. His journey is a continual pursuit of knowledge and creativity, bridging the worlds of tradition and imagination.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
December 17, 2025
"Bah!" said the reviewer. "Humbug! AI slop!"
Of all the possible interpretations of this beloved Christmas classic, a timeless masterpiece revisited countless times on stage and film, the one absolutely no one wanted was to have ChatGPT paraphrase the original text. Of what benefit is that? But, it rhymes! Whoop-de-doo. Are they good rhymes? Heavens, no! The forced rhyming scheme and milquetoast generative AI phrasing turns a yuletide feast into a tasteless slice of white bread soaked in rancid drippings. The unvarying 6-stanza imposition means that single scenes are inexplicably split into multiple repetitive chapters.
In short, the text is slop, produced and published by someone who has no sense of a sentence, paragraph, chapter, or any literary element. Any of the occasional worthy words or phrasing are lifted directly from the original text, which is all AI is capable of. There is nothing of value here not plainly stolen from the actually-written work.
Oh, but the illustrations! ... are horrible ChatGPT-generated pablum, rife with bizarrely variable head sizes, ignorant blocking, details that change wildly from image to image even though set supposedly in the exact same location, hallucinations like doorknobs installed on doorframes with no actual door to be found.
Here is the first "illustration" as an example. If you don't instantly see multiple things wrong here, I don't know what to say.
Why would anyone want to read this slop? A nigh-infinite number of vastly superior options exist, things that a human person invested an iota of thought and creativity into, rather than simply choosing which public domain material to have the slop machine re-churn out next. Of note, JUST READ THE ORIGINAL 'A CHRISTMAS CAROL'. No matter how many times you may have read it before, it will bring great joy, and if this is your first time all the better. Or watch any of the delightful film adaptations! The Muppet Christmas Carol. Scrooged. Spirited. Any classics featuring accomplished actors of yore. ANYTHING would be better than generative AI output. And if you insist on adding rhyming for some reason, many of these include songs.
You can read the real story for free any time at Project Gutenberg (gutenberg.org). Or get it from a library. Or ask your friends and relations if they have a copy. It's short. It's accessible. There is zero need for an AI retelling in any scenario.
If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with ‘AI’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!
Of all the possible interpretations of this beloved Christmas classic, a timeless masterpiece revisited countless times on stage and film, the one absolutely no one wanted was to have ChatGPT paraphrase the original text. Of what benefit is that? But, it rhymes! Whoop-de-doo. Are they good rhymes? Heavens, no! The forced rhyming scheme and milquetoast generative AI phrasing turns a yuletide feast into a tasteless slice of white bread soaked in rancid drippings. The unvarying 6-stanza imposition means that single scenes are inexplicably split into multiple repetitive chapters.
In short, the text is slop, produced and published by someone who has no sense of a sentence, paragraph, chapter, or any literary element. Any of the occasional worthy words or phrasing are lifted directly from the original text, which is all AI is capable of. There is nothing of value here not plainly stolen from the actually-written work.
Oh, but the illustrations! ... are horrible ChatGPT-generated pablum, rife with bizarrely variable head sizes, ignorant blocking, details that change wildly from image to image even though set supposedly in the exact same location, hallucinations like doorknobs installed on doorframes with no actual door to be found.
Here is the first "illustration" as an example. If you don't instantly see multiple things wrong here, I don't know what to say.
Why would anyone want to read this slop? A nigh-infinite number of vastly superior options exist, things that a human person invested an iota of thought and creativity into, rather than simply choosing which public domain material to have the slop machine re-churn out next. Of note, JUST READ THE ORIGINAL 'A CHRISTMAS CAROL'. No matter how many times you may have read it before, it will bring great joy, and if this is your first time all the better. Or watch any of the delightful film adaptations! The Muppet Christmas Carol. Scrooged. Spirited. Any classics featuring accomplished actors of yore. ANYTHING would be better than generative AI output. And if you insist on adding rhyming for some reason, many of these include songs.
You can read the real story for free any time at Project Gutenberg (gutenberg.org). Or get it from a library. Or ask your friends and relations if they have a copy. It's short. It's accessible. There is zero need for an AI retelling in any scenario.
If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with ‘AI’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!
December 27, 2025
Winner of Pierce's 2024 Razzie
Crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP!!! Gods, I wish I could give negative stars. Committing a travesty such as this should be a capital offense, but not only is that not the case, it's sanctioned by public domain law!
A truer word was never spoke, but huttese will get us closest, and here's what I've got for Sammy DenHart's latest literary desecration.
That's right; I said it. And that's just for starters! The anathemas of a thousand Sam Kinisons and George Carlins heaped upon it by the spade would be insufficient to damn this perversion to the degree it deserves. I read the sample on Amazon because I refuse to give this man one red cent for his abominations. I thought I had seen it all with his shitty play-by-play of The Skeleton Dance, but this rendition of Charles Dickens' immortal classic AI'd into verse is the piece de resistance. He's got the AABB rhyme scheme down; I'll give him that. Or rather, I'll give the machine that. I don't know if the prompt typer can tell one rhyme scheme from another; I kind of doubt it. As for the rhythm, fuck if I know what he or the machine are going for. Variousambic sundryameter, I suppose.
Shitty, putrid, ghastly writing aside, this also makes no fucking sense. Take this line. (PLEASE!)
"Crossed" is probably the wanted word. Past tense, present tense, who gives a shit? But "crossed" sums doesn't make much sense either. Did Scrooge and Cratchit spend their days playing Kakuro?
Jesus, this is so bad. So, so bad. Every single stanza I read has some inanity in it that makes me wish my pudding-boiled carcass were resting in its grave with a stake of holly through its heart. But you know who isn't resting in his grave? Dickens. He's got to be spinning like a lathe.
And I had only eight "chapters" to work with! And by "chapter," I mean "page." Every new page starts with chapter whatever, and they don't even make sense. The start of Scrooge's chat with the two charity do-gooders starts in chapter seven, then continues in chapter eight with a break right in the middle of the conversation. Why? What's the point of inserting a chapter break there? I know he's just trying to keep a consistent format (which is more than we can say for the rhythm) by putting a new chapter heading at the top of the left-hand page, but that's just asinine.
This is personal for me (as if you couldn't already tell.) A Christmas Carol is my favorite book. I've read it over 25 times; 30 if you count an occasional listen to the audiobook. It cuts me deep to see it treated with such disrespect, and my detestation and disgust could hardly be greater if I had come upon DenHartog marketing Dickens' corpse itself. I firmly believe that AI is going to bite us and bite us bad in the end. AI writing is just one facet of this technological Beelzebub we've constructed. The A is ignorance. The I is want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware the A, for on its brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it! Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And bide the end!
And speaking of the end, let me wrap this up. The terrible verse in this made me think of some life affirming poetry I heard in Home Improvement.
It's not because the poems are similar. It's what I wanted to happen to this book.
Yeah, and that too. Laws, this shit sucks a gorilla's gonorrheal gonad.
Crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP!!! Gods, I wish I could give negative stars. Committing a travesty such as this should be a capital offense, but not only is that not the case, it's sanctioned by public domain law!
A truer word was never spoke, but huttese will get us closest, and here's what I've got for Sammy DenHart's latest literary desecration.
That's right; I said it. And that's just for starters! The anathemas of a thousand Sam Kinisons and George Carlins heaped upon it by the spade would be insufficient to damn this perversion to the degree it deserves. I read the sample on Amazon because I refuse to give this man one red cent for his abominations. I thought I had seen it all with his shitty play-by-play of The Skeleton Dance, but this rendition of Charles Dickens' immortal classic AI'd into verse is the piece de resistance. He's got the AABB rhyme scheme down; I'll give him that. Or rather, I'll give the machine that. I don't know if the prompt typer can tell one rhyme scheme from another; I kind of doubt it. As for the rhythm, fuck if I know what he or the machine are going for. Variousambic sundryameter, I suppose.
Shitty, putrid, ghastly writing aside, this also makes no fucking sense. Take this line. (PLEASE!)
The firm went on, as if no loss.Cross? Were the sums mad at something?
Ledgers turned, and sums were cross.
"Crossed" is probably the wanted word. Past tense, present tense, who gives a shit? But "crossed" sums doesn't make much sense either. Did Scrooge and Cratchit spend their days playing Kakuro?
Dead as a door nail, say it twice.What the fuck are you even talking about? And don't try to explain it to me in the comments. I know exactly what the reference is. There's a wonderful paragraph in the source material, the second one in the book, in fact, where Dickens discusses door and coffin nails.
Repeat the phrase, and freeze it in ice.
Not coffin nail, though one might claim.
Keep ancient wisdom, keep the same.
Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for.Well, ladies and gentlemen, the country's done for due to DenHartog's disdain for the wisdom of our ancestors. Not only did his unholy hands disturb it by AI proxy, the sinner squeezed, wrenched, grasped, and scraped the ever-loving hell out of it, then he shat on it for good measure.
Jesus, this is so bad. So, so bad. Every single stanza I read has some inanity in it that makes me wish my pudding-boiled carcass were resting in its grave with a stake of holly through its heart. But you know who isn't resting in his grave? Dickens. He's got to be spinning like a lathe.
And I had only eight "chapters" to work with! And by "chapter," I mean "page." Every new page starts with chapter whatever, and they don't even make sense. The start of Scrooge's chat with the two charity do-gooders starts in chapter seven, then continues in chapter eight with a break right in the middle of the conversation. Why? What's the point of inserting a chapter break there? I know he's just trying to keep a consistent format (which is more than we can say for the rhythm) by putting a new chapter heading at the top of the left-hand page, but that's just asinine.
This is personal for me (as if you couldn't already tell.) A Christmas Carol is my favorite book. I've read it over 25 times; 30 if you count an occasional listen to the audiobook. It cuts me deep to see it treated with such disrespect, and my detestation and disgust could hardly be greater if I had come upon DenHartog marketing Dickens' corpse itself. I firmly believe that AI is going to bite us and bite us bad in the end. AI writing is just one facet of this technological Beelzebub we've constructed. The A is ignorance. The I is want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware the A, for on its brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it! Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And bide the end!
And speaking of the end, let me wrap this up. The terrible verse in this made me think of some life affirming poetry I heard in Home Improvement.
It's not because the poems are similar. It's what I wanted to happen to this book.
Yeah, and that too. Laws, this shit sucks a gorilla's gonorrheal gonad.
Read
December 20, 2025DNF/just bored
December 18, 2025
"A Christmas Carol in Rhyme," by Samuel DonHartog, starts with the dead of Jacob Marley and makes it sure that he is dead; there is no doubt of it.
The book with excellent rhyme and well-made stanzas tells the story of Scrooge and his relationship with Marley and other characters. It is fascinating to see the different stages Scrooge goes through described in good poetic language that has a good rhythm and flow and it is based on the original Christmas story of Scrooge. One sees how he goes through changes and gives us a good story to read whether you are a child or an adult.
The book with excellent rhyme and well-made stanzas tells the story of Scrooge and his relationship with Marley and other characters. It is fascinating to see the different stages Scrooge goes through described in good poetic language that has a good rhythm and flow and it is based on the original Christmas story of Scrooge. One sees how he goes through changes and gives us a good story to read whether you are a child or an adult.
December 13, 2025
What a wonderful way to read A Christmas tale.
The beautiful illustrations make this book even more of a delight. I will read this every year. A new holiday tradition!
The beautiful illustrations make this book even more of a delight. I will read this every year. A new holiday tradition!
December 26, 2025
A cute, rhyming story with wonderful illustrations. A book I'll read every year at Christmas time.
December 1, 2025
No. Just, no.
I can't think of a book to recommend in place of this slop, other than the one actually written by Charles Dickens, but there are several lovely movie adaptations of that book, including a Muppets movie... I certainly recommend that!
I can't think of a book to recommend in place of this slop, other than the one actually written by Charles Dickens, but there are several lovely movie adaptations of that book, including a Muppets movie... I certainly recommend that!
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews