Marika and her brother Frici love Christmas! Uncle Drosselmeier brings them some special Christmas present every year. This year, Marika gets a wooden soldier. A nutcracker. Frici thinks it looks strange, but Marika only sees the nutcracker's big, kind eyes. At night, he discovers that his new friend is capable of much more than just cracking nuts. He used to be a brave soldier who fell in love with a real princess... In this wonderful storybook, An Leysen puts E. T. A. Hoffmann's classic Christmas tale, The Nutcracker, in a new guise. The warm images transport us to the dream world of the terrible Mouse King and the magically beautiful Sugar Fairy.