Magic & miracles… Curses & keys… Can she help solve an impossible riddle and save a realm?
Twelve-year-old Nicola Hoffman should be at the biggest party of the year, but instead she’s snowed in at her grandmother’s house in rural New Mexico over Christmas break.
Oma Hoffman radiates Christmas joy but can’t connect with her resentful granddaughter. Nicola falls asleep under the Christmas tree, and upon waking finds herself transformed to the same size as the tree’s ornaments, who have come to life!
Greeted by a lovely caroler, Marette, Nicola learns that the realm of Tannenbaum is under a spell from the owl-sorcerer Ratbart, who overthrew their prince to claim control with a curse that allows the ornaments three nights leading up to Christmas to awaken and attempt to solve his riddle. If unsolved, Ratbart will claim Marette for his winter bride. The ornaments beg Nicola for help.
Unable to control the magic that transforms her, Nicola struggles to believe what’s happening is real, and how to explain it during the day. Regardless, she finds herself ornament-sized each night, with her new friends growing more worried that the curse will never be broken. But Oma has secrets of her own, and there’s more than meets the eye to this curse.
It's a race against time in this Nutcracker-Swan Lake fantasy adventure mashup, as Nicola must solve Ratbart’s riddle before the Christmas Eve ball, when he plans to claim Marette for his queen and declare his reign over Tannenbaum forever.
