Wartime Christmas Tales: A WWII Flash Fiction Anthology

by Dianne Ascroft, Mary D. Brooks, Anne Clare

Fourteen wartime Christmas tales for you to enjoy this holiday season. This collection of short stories is our gift to bring you something positive and joyful with which to end the year.

Soldiers stumbling upon mercy and miracles; children sharing gifts of friendship and love; romance finding its way into lonely, war-weary hearts; resistance fighters; spies; families on the home front—all bringing their own ray of hope in the darkest of times.

For this holiday season, we offer you this collection of short stories to lift your spirit, and to remember a time when love and the strength of human spirit prevailed.

We hope you will enjoy stepping back into the wartime Christmases in these stories with us.

Genres: Christmas, Historical Fiction, Fiction, World War II, Short Stories, Holiday, Ebooks

94 pages, Kindle Edition

First published December 1, 2020

About the author

I was born in Toronto, Canada and earned a B.A. in history at the University of Windsor. I've lived in Scotland and Northern Ireland since moving to Britain in 1990.

I've written historical and human interest articles for Canadian and Irish newspapers and magazines as well as contributing to an Irish local history book. 'Hitler and Mars Bars' is my first novel.

My official website is: www.dianneascroft.wordpress.com

I live with my husband on a farm in Northern Ireland. Curiosity about the past has inspired my longstanding interest in history and genealogy and my love of historical fiction. I'm a member of the Historical Novel Society and the Fermanagh Authors Association.My other interests include Celtic, folk and bluegrass music; hiking and travel.

Reviews

[Deacon Tom (Feeling Better) · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very touching book. Although it is fiction, I could relate to most of the stories.

Throughout the book I kept having flashbacks of my life in the military. For example, my first Christmas alone in Korea. I never felt so lonely and sad. I cried so much. This was before the internet. So I have no way of calling home except at the most expenses rates. So, I made some dumb decisions like drinking too much.

I loved these stories. If you know any military, especially the very young, please ask what they are doing for Christmas. You could be helping a lonely person.

I highly recommend

[Jennifer (not getting notifications) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great book. It was a free ebook about Christmas stories during WWII. I discovered some new authors to follow, too.

[A.L. Sowards]

Usually I finish a book before I write a review, but I'm making an exception for this one because I'd rather tell people about it now, while there's still time to read it before Christmas.

This is a collection of 14 short Christmas stories, all set during WWII. I wrote one of them. The stories are a variety of genres, so most readers will probably enjoy some stories more than others based on their preferences for writing styles and story types. Readers who enjoy the WWII era will appreciate the wide range of places and people covered.

My December is turning really busy with writing deadlines, online learning for my kids, and Christmas prep. I'm really enjoying being able to read through the stories and get a bit of Christmas fiction without a huge time commitment.

Here's a quote I loved from one of the other stories:

'Isn't that the point of Christmas?' he said. 'Just when everything gets almost too dark to bear, there's a spark of light.'

The book is a free gift to our readers. https://books2read.com/u/4XLDk7

Quick note for readers who prefer squeaky-clean reads: a few swear words in a few of the stories.

[Robyn Echols · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Wonderful Collection

I thoroughly enjoyed this collection of stories that took place during Christmas time during the Second World War. A wide variety of topics and focus, there was something to appeal to anyone who likes historical fiction. Well-written and a must-read.

[Darlene Foster · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a well-edited collection of short stories with a common theme, Christmas during WWII. The stories depict the tough times, but also the joy and glimmers of hope. A perfect book to read now as we feel sorry for ourselves during this time of pandemic and lockdowns. Dealing with six years of war would have been much worse.

[Victoria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful Christmas stories. Enjoy them very much

[Phil Yates · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wartime Christmas Tales is a collection of 14 short stories from World War II with something for everyone, from soldiers at the front, stumbling upon mercy and miracles, children sharing gifts of friendship, romance finding its way into war-weary hearts, resistance fighters, and spies—all bringing their own ray of hope to the darkest of times.

[Stacie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of very short stories from various authors, all of them new to me. The stories were all set at Christmas time during WWII including on the battlefield, in Paris, or at home. A soldier receives mercy because it is Christmas day after being found by the enemy. Children share gifts with a child who has nothing down the street. There are hopes of a romance blooming and a spy who doesn't have time to celebrate Christmas. This collection of stories is a quick read and if you are looking for a quick Christmas story, this might be just the thing to read during the season.

[Tim Fitzgerald · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heartwarming Christmas stories!

This is a wonderful collection of short stories all set at Christmas time during World War II. They exhibit the goodness of mankind even in the most difficult of times!

[Debbie Trammell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good stories

Very well written stories, makes me very thankful for peace and home so many people in these stories were hoping for. I think anyone would enjoy this stories esp as it is right before Christmas.

[Eric Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just learned what ‘flash fiction’ is this week – and this is the first anthology of flash fiction that I’ve read. If this is any indication of how good very short stories can be, I’ll be reading a lot more. The quality of the stories here is uniformly high. All the stories but one are set in Europe during the Second World War, and all are told from the point of view of the Allies or the peoples of Nazi-occupied Europe. In one or two of them, Germans are shown in a more positive light, but on the whole the picture presented is a largely accurate one. There are one or two cases where a twist would have made a story better, in my opinion. Highly recommended, and — incredibly — you can download this for free to your Kindle.

[Julieann · Rating 5 out of 5]

These are short stories (very short tales) and chapters from books, set on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Most are set in WWII, though not all are.
Like all books of short stories, this is most enjoyable when you read one or maybe two stories then leave the book. For one thing, if you read it straight through it gets a little too much. One at a time they are fun, often thought provoking. And don't forget you can read short stories in any order with no problem.

[AJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

Christmas Historical Fiction

I loved this book. Each chapter is a short story and after if you want call look up more about the author. I would recommend to anyone around Christmas to see different flashback moments. One or two stories I didn't like as much but overall a great book! This book helped me feel happy and ready for Christmas. Some of the authors are doing their own little book giveaway which is awesome. Only 97 pages so it's a cute short read.

[Lucy Kubash · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting collection of WW II stories.

This is a collection of flash fiction stories all set during WW II. Enjoyable short reads that even in their brevity manage to teach something about that time period and what people went through. I wished many of the stories were longer so to learn more about the characters.

[Ruth · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a collection of 14 short stories. There will be elements of the era or of battle scenes in these stories. I feel they are done a bit differently in an interesting way. We will be in a WWII hospital and London during the Blitz among other places. My favorite location was Norway, as it is my primary ancestral country.

[Sharon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful book of short Christmas stories set during WWII. The last one was my least favorite because of the language, but I wish every story could’ve been longer as they were interesting. That’s the only reason for the 4 stars. I plan on checking out other WWII books written by some of these authors.

[LuAnn · Rating 3 out of 5]

War and peace

This was a conglomerate of short stories taking place mostly around WWII. I enjoyed reading them very much and would recommend it to anyone who likes historical fiction.

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful variety of Christmas stories

So glad I finally read this group of WWII wartime Christmas stories. Each one is unique and a couple of them brought me to tears I highly recommend this short story collection and hope to read more by the authors.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

My review for Wartime Christmas Tales

An interesting collection of stories about WW II. Some of them are a bit depressing, but they make you thoughtful. The goal is to appreciate what one has and remember there is always hope.

[Joy Kidney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fourteen compelling vignettes written by award-winning authors, mostly women, set in different European countries. Too bad the last one contained vulgar language.

[Betty J Stevens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some were good, some were so-so.

[Sanjay]

This book is amazing. It just has a very happy feeling when reading it because it's about christmas miracles and children.

[Sally Van Slyke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short stories for Christmas

Great short stories form WWII at Christmas. Introduced me to new authors that I would love to read more from them.

[Pat · Rating 4 out of 5]

The stories were good enough that I wished they were longer.

[Arthur Estes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quick read, interesting storirs

At this time of year these stories were very appropriate. They were interesting to read and easy to get through.

[Sally Andrews · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book of brief stories. Some of them left me wishing for more.

[Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

All very brief stories, snippets of WW2.

[Frieda Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wartime Christmas Tales

A collection of short stories of Christmas-time during WWII. Written by authors from across the globe. Left me wanting more!

[B · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good stories

These were really good stories. I loved reading them. I like reading short stories once in awhile. Wonderful work guys!!

[Trudie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good little collection of wartime short stories