Hazel & Katniss & Harry & Starr is a weekly Canadian podcast about young adult literature, their film and television adaptations, and everything in between. Now in its sixth season, the podcast—hosted by film critic Joe Lipsett and English professor Brenna Clarke-Gray—aims to highlight the cultural worth of young adult and middle-grade texts, with a focus on Canadian, Indigenous and minority creatives and stories.

Join us weekly for deep dives, as well as a round of YA BINGO.

Book 6, Chapter 15: My True Love Gave To Me

Brenna and Joe celebrate the holiday season with a look at the Stephanie Perkins-edited collection of seasonal stories.

We chat about the stories we liked the best, including “It’s a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown”, “Krampuslauf”, “Midnights”, “The Girl Who Broke The Dreamer” and “Welcome to Christmas, CA”.

Then we have special lumps of coal for a few less successful entries, including “Polaris is Where You’ll Find Me”, “What The Hell Have You Done, Sophie Roth?” and “Star of Bethelem”.

It’s a mixed bag!

Read on for more about this week’s episode from co-host Joe Lipsett:

It’s something of a holiday tradition for Brenna and I to tackle at least one holiday text for Christmas. In the past, we’ve discussed the Netflix series adaptation of Dash and Lily (listen here) as well as the feature adaptation of Let It Snow (listen here).

Of course we’ve already talked about Stephanie Perkins this year when we tackled There’s Someone Inside Your House during our October Spooky Season.

This collection of short stories proves she’s a better author than editor as there’s some pretty glaring issues with a few stories. But overall, it’s a fun stocking stuffer that teens will enjoy finding under the tree come Christmas Day -JL

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