In Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale the young prince says, 'A sad tale's best for winter'. He probably means 'serious' rather than 'ending unhappily'. This is one of my favourite books for winter. It's a dark, entirely satisfying story which ends - the way it should. Set sometime in the past, somewhere in central Europe, it's a sort of Gothic novel, featuring , among other characters, a violent suit of armour. It's about the value of hard work, kindness and courage, but it's also about storytelling, and indeed clockwork. It doesn't take long to read but you'll remember it forever.
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