Charles Dickens is known not only for his novels but also for his shorter works. Particularly notable are his five Christmas novellas especially <I>A Christmas Carol</I>. In this genre Dickens's stories had a powerful commercial impulse for it became an annual tradition for the author to publish one in time for the holiday season between 1843 and 1847. <I>Three Short Stories</I> brings together a trio of the celebrated author's Christmas stories: <I>The Cricket on the Hearth</I> <I>The Battle of Life</I> and <I>The Haunted Man</I>. All three lay emphasis on family love and the delights of home but there is more to these stories than surface sentimentality. Each year a whole nation would eagerly anticipate these tales telling us much about the age Dickens lived in. And these stories never would have survived without roots and power.