THE BEST CHRISTMAS PAGEANT EVER

The young narrator, whose mother is saddled with directing the Church's annual Christmas pageant, becomes newly (but for the reader predictably) aware of the season's true meaning after the horrible Herdmans, a family of truly terrifying brats, bully themselves into the major roles — Mary; Joseph, the Angel, the Wise Men — and take their parts fervently if unconventionally to heart.

By the starry, snow-soft ending this is revealed as the same old Christmas story after all (and really there was never a chance of any other outcome), but the Herdmans' outrages — from setting fires, stealing, and blackmailing other children at home and school to burping the baby Jesus and bearing a ham (a more suitable offering in their hungry eyes than oil or perfume) at the pageant — add enough spice to make this one livelier than most.