About this issue: Overview
Season’s greetings
To our vendors you are much more than a customer. You’re a friendly face in a crowd, a warm word on a cold day, an English teacher, a friend, and often a lifeline. Those who sell the magazine in Yorkshire and Humber follow our North West vendors last week in wishing their customers a happy Xmas.
Calling card
A Christmas ghost story.
High and dry
Around nine million turkeys are reared for Christmas each year in the UK but this year Brits are in a bit of a flap about whether bird flu will leave them without. Susan Griffin assesses the situation and finds out why we eat it in the first place.
Many hands make light work
Energy bills may be soaring but there’s no chance of a blackout for the people who string thousands of lights across their homes each Christmas. Gary Ryan meets the people inside some of the North’s most illuminated houses.
Central heating
After a mild autumn the arrival of freezing weather has driven those who can’t afford home heating to use so-called warm banks or spaces. Roger Ratcliffe visits two of them.
Music Q&A: Villagers
Duke Ellington, David Lynch, the devotional music of Alice Coltrane and night swimming on a Dutch island are listed among the inspirations for Fever Dreams, Conor O’Brien’s fifth LP under his Villagers moniker.
Plus
News, arts and entertainment, columnists Roger Ratcliffe and James Meadway, giant Xmas crossword – and more.