Looks at some of the problems that can come up during holiday get-togethers and presents solutions to nearly various potential problems. This book details the pros and cons of going home for a major family holiday, offers advice on how to approach the choice, how to explain your decision without hurting others' feelings, and more.

This holiday, spend quality time with family and loved ones—living and dead . . . There's no place like home for the horrordays—unless you'd prefer a romantic midnight walk through a ghost-infested graveyard . . . or a haunted house candlelight dinner with the sexy vampire of your dreams. The (black) magical season is here—and whether it's a solstice séance gone demonically wrong with the incomparable Kim Harrison, a grossly misshapen Christmas with the remarkable Lynsay Sands, a blood-chilling-and-spilling New Year's with the wonderful Marjorie M. Liu, or a super-powered Thanksgiving with the phenomenal Vicki Pettersson, one thing is for certain: in the able hands of these exceptional dark side explorers, the holidays are going to be deliciously hellish!

A “hair-raisingly hilarious” journey through danger zones from Belfast to Gaza, by the #1 New York Times–bestselling author (Vanity Fair). “Tired of making bad jokes” and believing that “the world outside seemed a much worse joke than anything I could conjure,” journalist and political satirist P. J. O’Rourke decided to traverse the globe on a fun-finding mission, investigating the way of life in the most desperate places on the planet, including Warsaw, Managua, and Belfast. The result is Holidays in Hell—a full-tilt, no-holds-barred romp through politics, culture, and ideology. The author’s adventures include storming student protesters’ barricades with riot police in South Korea, interviewing communist insurrectionists in the Philippines, and going undercover dressed in Arab garb in the Gaza Strip. He also takes a look at America’s homegrown horrors as he braves the media frenzy surrounding the Reagan-Gorbachev summit in Washington DC, uncovers the mortifying banality behind the white-bread kitsch of Jerry Falwell’s Heritage USA, and survives the stultifying boredom of Harvard’s 350th anniversary celebration. Packed with classic riffs on everything from Polish nightlife under communism to Third World driving tips, Holidays in Hell is one of the best-loved books by “one of America’s most hilarious writers” (Time). “Wickedly amusing.” —The Baltimore Sun “Funny, outrageous, perceptive.” —The Washington Post Book World

Who doesn't love to open the mailbox during the holidays and find a newsletter? Whether it's a juicy missive from a college roommate inadvertently revealing her husband's wandering eye, a self-congratulatory account of a cousin's rise to power at the local fast-food joint, or a mind-numbingly detailed account of a year's medical ailments (including photos) from a coworker, they're always entertaining. Christmas Letters from Hell skewers holiday letters of all shapes and sizes, from the ones that come crammed with cheesy graphics or written from the perspective of the recently neutered family dog to those filled with stories of "perfect" family vacations that were clearly anything but. Here Santa uses his holiday letter to let the elves know that he'll be outsourcing to China effective immediately; a bipolar mom tells two very different versions of the year's events; and Osama bin Laden touches base with his high school host family in Minneapolis. Christmas Letters from Hell serves up a steaming, savory blend of the holiday cheer, humor, and twisted truth in our well-intended attempts to stay in touch gone horribly, horribly wrong.

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