📱📖 Read as an eBook | 📃 116 pages
⏱ Duration: 2 hours (because I was trying to solve it myself)
📩 ARC by the author | Genre: Puzzles
🏷️ Publisher name: Independently published (Oct 4, 2026)
Book Blurb:
Wrackmouth, a fishing town on the north-east coast of England, December 1958. The treasurer of the chapel Christmas Club is found at low tide below the Quay Steps. £86 is missing from the club box, and the town has already decided she took it. In her bag is a soaked receipt for somebody else’s registered letter. Post office clerk Nellie Tamsley has copied every registered letter the office took in, 1,200 lines, and one of them matches. Over 24 dated chapters, you strike lines from the November Book until three remain, then work out which sender lied.
Let’s talk about the book:
Each night, Nellie Tamsley, a 1958 post-office counter clerk, learns one thing about a water-ruined registered-letter receipt. You then strike every line in a 1,200-line register that the clue rules out. After 24 nights, three lines remain. A final “who lied?” step turns those three lines into a culprit.
It works, and I checked. I went through all 1,200 lines of the November Book and replayed the 24 readings. Every checkpoint count on page 40 matched exactly, from 1,013 on the first night down to 3 on Christmas Eve. When I dropped each reading in turn, four or more lines survived every time, so the copyright-page claim that “every one of the twenty-four readings is needed” is true. The weekdays match the real November 1958 calendar, and registration numbers and dates rise in order. The four Counter Cards at the back each have exactly one solution, and it matches the printed answer. Rigour like this is rare in puzzle books, and it’s the book’s main selling point.
The book:
The craft is lovely. The clues are tied to the story rather than being arbitrary filters. Night 4 uses the double-t bar in “Street”, night 14 the dented odd digits of the date stamp, night 23 ink versus copying-pencil in harbour water, and night 24 an s-tail crossing a P. The premise that the slip can only ever answer “no” explains why the solving is elimination, and it justifies the whole format. The period detail is good: twopence versus twopence-halfpenny cards, trunk calls via the operator, and the registration-fee cover tiers. Night 8 plants the unrecorded fee column, which pays off at the climax. The £86 shortfall adds up to the £40 plus £46 in Coldwell’s confession.
The prose is economical and warm, and the chapters are short (about 8,700 words of story in all). The author’s touches, like Brisk beginning “to rule lines under things”, give Nellie and Brisk real charm.
This suits fans of logic puzzles and cozy historical mysteries who like pencil-and-paper work and don’t mind a ritual of a few minutes a night. It’s less suited to readers who want a twisty whodunit. It also has no website or app dependency, with hints, checkpoints and answers all in the book.
One caveat on my own reading: I worked from the PDF’s text layer, so I haven’t judged the visual design, page layout or print legibility of the dense register pages. I would highly recommend purchasing the paperback for this copy. Believe me, it’s worth it
Would I recommend it?
Post Early for Christmas by T.J. Sumi is a 24-night advent puzzle book set in a 1958 post office, and I read it as an ARC by the author. Rigour like this is rare in puzzle books. I parsed all 1,200 register lines to be sure… and every single checkpoint matched. If logic puzzles and cosy historical mysteries are your thing, and a pencil plus a few quiet minutes each night sounds like your December, add this to your TBR. It is out now. Not the one for you if you want a twisty whodunit, though. And if you finish it wanting more, the next book from the same author, Ring for the Ferry, a twelve-night ferry ledger, is coming soon.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Book recommendations
- Ring for the Ferry by T.J. Sumi
Coming soon from the same author, a twelve-night ferry ledger, so you will have something to sharpen your pencil for once Christmas is over.
Goodreads | Pagebound | Amazon Canada
- Murdle by G.T. Karber
If the logic-grid side of Post Early for Christmas was your favourite part, this is a whole book of murder puzzles solved by elimination.
Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy
- The Appeal by Janice Hallett
You get the documents and work out who did it yourself, which is the same itch Nellie’s register scratches.
Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy
- A Murder Is Announced by Agatha Christie
A postwar English setting and a puzzle with fair clues, for readers who liked the 1950s feel.
Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy
- Silent Nights: Christmas Mysteries, edited by Martin Edwards
Short, classic Christmas crime stories, ideal for the nights between puzzle sessions.
Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary
Pencils Ready? Tell Me Your Advent Habits
Do you start an advent puzzle book on December 1, or do you cheat and binge the first week (no judgement, I took two hours)? Have you ever tried a puzzle book that tells a full mystery, or is a pencil and a paper register more work than you want in December? Tell me in the comments.
Book Links
Goodreads | Pagebound | Hardcover | Amazon.ca
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