What better gift to give and receive at Christmas than one that brings comfort, solace, inspiration, enjoyment and learning? Books are readily available, they are inexpensive and they are bound to be treasured, for as Stephen King put it, they are ‘a uniquely portable magic’.

I love to browse bookstores and choose book gifts for friends and family based on their individual interests; a volume of poetry for one, a cookbook for another. I especially enjoy choosing books for children; the more fabulously fantastical, the better. Sometimes, the gifts I choose are more artwork than text, like this Pop-Up Guide to Hogwarts that caught my eye in a bookstore window last week and just begged to be purchased for a little wizard-in-training:

Choosing the books is just part of the pleasure; I love wrapping the gifts too. Of course, the recipient will easily guess by the feel of the gift that it is a book. When I receive a book, that’s part of the joy, knowing that the wonderful ‘new book’ feeling is nigh. I love this festive wrapping paper from The Literary Gift Company:

For me, it is a personal tradition to give books at Christmas, but for some the tradition is part of the very culture in which they live. I am referring to the people of Iceland, who have developed a custom called Jólabókaflóðið, which translates to ‘Christmas book flood’.

It begins in November, when publishers flood the market with new books. The Iceland Publishers Association sends every household in Iceland the Bókatíðindi, a catalogue of the new books, and people order their Christmas book gifts from the Bókatíðindi.

The tradition of exchanging books at Christmas in Iceland dates back to the Second World War, when paper was one of the few commodities not rationed, which meant books were the easiest gifts to buy. Since then, Iceland has developed into a nation of book lovers. The BBC reports:

Iceland is experiencing a book boom. This island nation of just over 300,000 people has more writers, more books published and more books read, per head, than anywhere else in the world.

Icelanders put books at the heart of cultural life. Literature is the hot topic of conversation in the media and at public gatherings.

The books in the Jólabókaflóðið are for Icelanders, and often by Icelanders. ‘Ad ganga med bok I maganum,’ they say in Iceland; ‘everyone gives birth to a book’. One in ten Icelanders publish a book. According to The Bookseller, Icelandic authors are underpaid – and yet they write. For the love of books.

Christmas Eve is when Icelanders exchange books gifts, and it is traditional then to curl up with your new book and a box of chocolates. Sounds perfect to me. I wonder whether my family could be convinced to do Christmas Eve the Icelandic way…