How to “Win Christmas”

Adrian Todd Zuniga
5 min readDec 2, 2021

Four years ago, I was looking for the perfect gift for my fiancée — something personal, creative, the sort of thing that would plain wow her and “win Christmas.”

And over the last four years, I’ve done exactly that by writing her a book using Mimeo, a book-creation software in my MacBook’s Photos app. (And below, I explain how you can do the same.)

These are no ordinary books, mind you! The first was a batshit collection of PACIFIC RIM FAN FICTION — eight weirdo stories that pulled from a cinematic universe she loved, and I knew pretty much nothing about.

There’s this great monologue from the film where Idris Elba shouts out, “Today we are CANCELING THE APOCALYPSE!” A line she and I would say to one another when we canceled plans or changed our minds, or just felt like shouting. So I titled her first Xmas collection CANCELING THE APOCALYPSE, as you can see below. And below that, a spread from the book.

A “masterpiece” according to a fake New York Times review on the book jacket.
Making up the kaiju name “Dingus Hooray” has been one of my life’s greatest joys.

IN YEAR TWO, I tried to out-do myself by doing an ambitious mash-up of two of my fiancée’s…

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Adrian Todd Zuniga
Adrian Todd Zuniga

Written by Adrian Todd Zuniga

is an award-nominated author (Collision Theory), award-winning director/screenwriter (HOLD ME, DON'T TOUCH ME) and the creator and host of Literary Death Match.