87 Books Like Lucia Morning in Sweden

First published in 1966, I love this classic for its quiet invitation into a rural Swedish farmhouse and the family’s preparations for Christmas.

When the children go to bed in their cozy home, the snowy farm outside is being protected by a red-capped, long-bearded tomte (Swedish gnome). Even in a loud world, this quiet book captures a child’s attention as we watch the tomte share his annual gift of Christmas porridge with a hungry fox, thus saving the day for the chickens in the chicken house.

While the book is only subtly a Christmas story, its message of generosity and selflessness reminds us of some of the reasons why we celebrate the holiday.

Out of the many Christmas picture books my children received when they were small, this is the one that still gets pulled out and re-read every year.

Annika and her family draw us in as they prepare for the annual Christmas Eve smorgasbord. We hope, along with the main character, Annika, that this year we’ll be lucky and find an almond in the rice pudding, granting us our dearest wishes for the year.

We feel Annika’s moral dilemma when she does find the almond and wonders what she should wish for. Her love for her disabled little brother helps us understand once again that selfless love is at the heart of our favorite holiday.

The enchanting photographs follow a Scandinavian-looking little girl as she acts on her greatest wish of adventuring north to join Santa’s elves.

A different animal guides her on each leg of the journey. Normally, I don’t much care for stories of small children who are left alone in the care of animal companions (remember Good Dog, Carl?), but what child wouldn’t want to imagine themselves ultimately flying with a reindeer or guiding Santa’s sleigh?

The ending leaves you wondering if it was just a dream after all, with the main character safe in her own bed. The pictures capture the Nordic spirit of the book, combining Scandinavian style with an America-style Santa Claus, and I really like the way that the photographs and simple charm set this book apart.

No list of Nordic-inspired picture books is complete without at least one book by Jan Brett!

While not specifically set in a Scandinavian country, the Nordic-sweatered elf, the Dala horse displayed prominently in a workroom, and the delightfully detailed borders place the book in this category for me and my Swedish-American family. 

When the children were small, we read this together many, many times. It follows the story of an elf charged with getting Santa’s reindeer ready for the big night. Teeka, the elf, is new to the job, and the reindeer are reluctant to follow her orders.

Each time I read it, I legitimately worry when the reindeer’s antlers become hopelessly tangled!

This book brilliantly depicts life in Iranian mountain villages. Erica Friedl has spent years on and off over decades living quietly among her friends in Deh Koh.

Friedl, an anthropologist, writes with feeling and telling detail as she tells of her friends and neighbors. As I read her “stories,” the women in Deh Koh ceased to be characters in a book but people with concerns that helped me understand how their motivations inspired actions.

I especially loved the story about the woman who was now approaching middle-age and was expected to stop having physical relations with her husband. She loved her husband, and he loved her, and sex was an expression of her love. She couldn’t give him up. Then, she became pregnant!

I read with fascination as Friedl’s expressive account of Iranian life and the connections between men, women, their children, larger families, and neighbors played out in small… show more.

Strong female voices guide the main character through a fantastic journey of self-discovery amidst the push and pull of power.

This series had me hooked after the first page. The power plays, the steady hand of the female characters, the drama, and discovering how you fit into a world when you think you do not belong. The family was everything—even if it was not blood. 

Gideon Holiday loves Christmas. He’s literally dripping with holiday cheer. Unfortunately, his grumpy next-door neighbor, Paul, the man Gideon is crushing on something fierce, hasn’t a drop of appreciation for the holiday or the accompanying festivities. That holds true until Paul finds out the younger brother he raised plans to visit for the holidays. Just like when they were kids, Paul seeks to give his brother a joyous holiday to make up for the tough times they had when his brother was a kid. But since he knows nothing about getting into the holiday spirit, he’ll need Gideon’s fabulous Christmas powers to make this the best holiday his younger brother has ever had.

This story is filled with humor and heat. While Gideon is teaching Paul how to loosen up and join in on the neighborhood holiday fun, Paul also teaches Gideon that he doesn’t have to be lonely. It’s… show more.

At school Sam feels different from his classmates because he celebrates both Christmas and Hanukkah, but after talking it through with his mom, he realizes that he’s excited to be able to observe two holidays instead of one.

The book addresses a child’s feeling of being different because his parents have different religious backgrounds.

I absolutely love Hallmark Christmas movies! Much to my husband’s chagrin, I fill up our DVR with Hallmark movies every November and December and never manage to watch them all. Many of those movies have a royal theme with a prince or princess wanting some normalcy and finding love with an American “commoner.” I originally saw this book on a shelf at Barnes & Noble and knew it would be an enjoyable holiday read. The author didn’t disappoint as she spun the tale of a NYC cab driver and his younger sister who cross paths with Princess Marie of Eldovia.  

Now that the cottagecore movement is becoming more well-known, it is often associated with slow living. Before it became a trend, it began as a way for members of the LGBTQIA+ and Black communities to embrace a softer lifestyle that was so often not an option for them.

One of the main aspects of cottagecore is to live more in tune with nature and the seasons, or at the very least, to remind yourself to stop and notice. I have always loved this about the cottagecore aesthetic, and I think that The Wheel of the Year is the perfect book to learn more about living seasonally and where our modern seasonal traditions come from.

This book showcases that there is magic in everything around you, and it’s mainly geared toward young readers who want to learn more about how to follow seasonal rhythms, but adults can certainly still learn from… show more.