Deb­bie Ja­cob

You can bet your life that I'm go­ing to sug­gest the best pos­si­ble Christ­mas gifts of all: books. Giv­ing the gift of books opens up a whole new world of ex­pe­ri­ences for those peo­ple on your Christ­mas list. It gives those spe­cial peo­ple in your life the abil­i­ty to learn some­thing spe­cial about them­selves. Here are some of my favourite books I dis­cov­ered this year. There are al­so some books that are on my "to read" list.

1. The Im­mortelle Life of Hen­ri­et­ta Lacks by Re­bec­ca Skloot: This is my choice for the best sci­ence-re­lat­ed non-fic­tion for last year. The Im­mortelle Life of Hen­ri­et­ta Lacks is the fas­ci­nat­ing true sto­ry of Hen­ri­et­ta Lacks, a poor African-Amer­i­can mi­grant to­bac­co farm work­er and moth­er of five who died of can­cer in 1951 at the age of 30. Her ag­gres­sive can­cer baf­fled and in­trigued sci­en­tists who de­cid­ed to study her tis­sue. Out of Hen­ri­et­ta's cells they grew HeLa cells for study­ing many dis­eases. The cure for po­lio can be linked to Hen­ri­et­ta. Her can­cer cells were used in count­less re­search projects for can­cer re­search. The irony is that her poor fam­i­ly, lit­er­al­ly and fig­u­ra­tive­ly speak­ing, nev­er knew that Hen­ri­et­ta's dis­eased cells were be­ing sold and that they are a mul­ti-bil­lion dol­lar busi­ness. This is a fas­ci­nat­ing book for any­one in­to sci­ence, bi­ogra­phies and great non-fic­tion in gen­er­al.

2. The Par­tic­u­lar Sad­ness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Ben­der: On her ninth birth­day, Rose Edel­stein bites in­to her lemon birth­day cake, made by her moth­er, and dis­cov­ers she can read her moth­er's emo­tions. The Par­tic­u­lar Sad­ness of Lemon Cake was my favourite fic­tion for this year. It is a beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten book about what we see and know about life. This is a beau­ti­ful­ly writ­ten book that will al­so make you think about how we all have spe­cial gifts.

3. In a Heart­beat: If you saw the movie The Blind Side based on Michael Lewis' best-sell­ing book, you al­ready know the sto­ry of the Tuo­hys who took a poor, black teenag­er, Michael Oher, in­to their home, adopt­ed him and made him an NFL foot­ball star. It doesn't seem that there would be any more to say about that, but.In a Heart­beat is the Tuo­hys' own sto­ry about their jour­ney and their phi­los­o­phy of giv­ing. This book is part bi­og­ra­phy, part au­to­bi­og­ra­phy and part in­spi­ra­tional lit­er­a­ture. There is so much to con­tem­plate in this book. It re­al­ly made me think dif­fer­ent­ly about mon­ey and giv­ing in gen­er­al. In a Heart­beat is a cel­e­bra­tion of joy­ful giv­ing. It's great to know that in this cold, cru­el world there are peo­ple who give from the heart and ex­pect noth­ing in re­turn. This book is re­al­ly a guide to liv­ing and lov­ing.

4. Full Dark, No Stars: Stephen King has a new book out; four hor­rif­ic, short sto­ries, dis­turb­ing in a King-like way. A woman dis­cov­ers her ca­pac­i­ty for re­venge af­ter she is as­sault­ed and left for dead. King makes my list of Christ­mas gifts be­cause I think he is great­ly un­der-rat­ed as a short sto­ry writer. I have al­ways pre­ferred King's short sto­ries to his nov­els, but then that could be be­cause I can't take that much ten­sion!

5. The Con­fes­sion: A Nov­el by John Gr­isham: Ac­tion-packed Gr­isham nov­els are a safe bet for Christ­mas. Gr­isham has a new nov­el out just in time for the hol­i­days. This is the sto­ry of two men: one con­vict­ed of a crime he didn't com­mit and one who gets away with the crime. Af­ter nine years, Travis, the man who com­mit­ted the crime, learns he has an in­op­er­a­ble brain tu­mour. He tries to right the in­jus­tice he has com­mit­ted and con­fess to the crime. His chal­lenge is to con­vince every­one-lawyers, judges and politi­cians-that he's telling the truth. Time is run­ning out. In four days, Donte is go­ing to be ex­e­cut­ed for the crime that Travis com­mit­ted.

6. Un­bro­ken by Lau­ra Hil­len­brand: This is at the top of my "to read" list. Al­though I haven't got my hands on Un­bro­ken yet, I am anx­ious­ly await­ing its ar­rival be­cause Hil­len­brand's book Seabis­cuit is one of the best books I ever read. Hil­len­brand ac­tu­al­ly came across this sto­ry when she was writ­ing the sto­ry of the fa­mous race­horse Seabis­cuit. Un­bro­ken is the sto­ry of Louie Zam­peri­ni, a ju­ve­nile delin­quent who ran in the Olympics and sur­vived a plane crash over the Pa­cif­ic while he was in the army. Hil­len­brand is get­ting rave re­views for her lat­est non-fic­tion.

7. The Sug­ar King of Ha­vana: The Rise and Fall of Julio Lobo, Cu­ba's Last Ty­coon by John Paul Rath­bone: There are many books about Cas­tro's rev­o­lu­tion and there are many books about Cu­ba be­fore Cas­tro's rev­o­lu­tion. This book cap­tures that tran­si­tion be­tween the two. It is the fas­ci­nat­ing bi­og­ra­phy of a Cuban sug­ar mag­nate. This is a colour­ful, cru­cial pe­ri­od of Cuban his­to­ry that makes a riv­et­ing read.

Next week: I'm com­pil­ing my list of Caribbean fic­tion and check­ing it twice. Caribbean fic­tion is a must this Christ­mas. Read it and give it and keep Caribbean lit­er­a­ture in print.