An old favorite
Meredith Nicholson, a prolific Indiana author of the early twentieth century and now the subject of a first-ever biography, wrote A REVERSIBLE SANTA CLAUS in 1917. Based upon a short story, "The Hopper," in Collier's (December 30, 1916), the book is a delightful farce about an unintentional kidnapping (a child was in the car the Hopper stole on Christmas eve while trying to get home) and his attempts to return the child before its feuding parents, as the thief/kidnapper later learned, realized their little boy was missing. Well plotted and fast paced, the book remains an interesting example of a master story teller's art.