Archive for September, 2009

My reading of the first Charlie adventure was a resounding success with the young Alexander. The logical thing to do was to go ahead and read the second adventure, one that places Charlie, family and Mr Wonka in decidedly quirky places. Having just crashed through the roof of the Bucket residence to collect grandparents and parents, the Great Glass Elevator takes off without much fanfare and launches straight into space.

As luck would have it, the USA has a shuttle in orbit making its way to the first-ever Space Hotel. The appearance of the Glass Elevator with odd figures dressed in pyjamas floating about in zero gravity makes the population of the USA and its president rather nervous. That is until our intrepid adventurers save the shuttle crew from a rather nasty attack by Vermicious Knids that have made the Space Hotel USA their home.

The wacky adventure continues in much the same vein: after their short stint in space, the glass elevator comes to rest back in the chocolate factory. Charlie is the heir to the Wonka chocolate empire, and requires some hands to help him run it. The most logical solution is at hand: Wonka Vite is able to reduce anyone’s age and make them young again. A common theme in Dahl‘s books re-emerges in this scene: human greed results in three of Charlie‘s grandparents regressing to the age of 2 years old. The third has taken even more pills and has regressed to a negative age, minus two, to be exact. Charlie and Wonka climb back into the elevator and travel the nether regions of the earth to enter Minusland in a bid to save Grandma Georgina. In the end, all grandparents end up at their original old age after a dose of the anti-Wonka Vite, Vita-Wonk. A visit to the White House rounds out the adventure, following on the rescue of the astronauts during the Space Hotel incident.

It’s a great read and hugely entertaining. Best of all, reading a single chapter encourages remembering the story so far and being able to recount what happened last. Dahl‘s stories are certainly off-the-wall, but highly recommended. It is good to see a book written in the early 1970′s competing well against the modern miracles of entertainment, such as the PS3 and the iPod Touch…

I’ve always been quite partial to Stoker‘s original horror novel depicting the bloodsucking Transylvanian Dracula. I’ve read that old tale many a time, both in paper and electronic formats and have followed various remakes and movie versions with interest.

Bram Stoker lived in a time when a single work was good enough. Sequels weren’t all that popular then, it seems. Fast forward to the present day: it’s sequel time and who better to pen another official Dracula tale than the original author’s great-grand-nephew. The new book is inventively titled Dracula The Un-Dead and tells the tale of the undead count approximately 25 years after his demise at the hands of Van Helsing.

I’m guessing this is a bit of a marketing gimmick and that the name Stoker is on the cover simply to give the book an air of authority. The co-author is Ian Holt, a Dracula historian. I’m quite certain that the ending will leave the door open for at least another sequel…

Should be an interesting read nonetheless. Read more about the plot here.