What do these books have in common? Esquire’s World of Golf, Robert Daley’s thriller Tainted Evidence, Simon Stow’s political analysis American Mourning, Dianne E Gray’s coming-of-age story Holding Up the Earth and James Hall’s “odyssey into the spirit world of Africa”, Sangoma?

Well, they’re all green. That was enough for them to be selected as part of the Christmas tree of books that currently stands in the White House library. Melania Trump’s director of communications Stephanie Grisham told the Washington Post that they were chosen “based on their varieties of green colour tones”.

Only jackets required … some of the books in the White House library Christmas ‘tree’. Photograph: Alex Wong/Getty Images

“The concept for the colour of the room was red and green, hence the green books and red ribbons,” she added, to make herself entirely clear.

It’s an unusual method for choosing holiday reading, making what the Post’s Nora Krug calls a “perplexing assortment”. As publisher Melville House’s Stephanie DeLuca puts it, the choice of the thriller, Tainted Evidence, “really just seems like too easy of a joke to make”.

There’s a comfy looking chair installed next to the book tree, but it seems clear enough that nobody expects anyone will actually want to read the books. So if the decorations tempt the president or his wife into the library over the festive season, what could they peruse instead?