This is a delightful, funny and exciting story about a special friendship between two people from different worlds – a giant and a child. As the story develops it shows how trust and love develops between them. It also shows that bullying must not be tolerated and Dahl is at his might best here by eventually ensuring the big bad giants get their comeuppance whilst the big friendly giant wins the day alongside the little girl Sophie. The text is perfectly complemented with illustrations by Quentin Blake. Unbelievably moving.
Roald Dahl was born in Wales of Norwegian parents – the child of a second marriage. His father and elder sister died when Roald was just three. His mother was left to raise two stepchildren and her own four children. Roald was her only son.
He had an unhappy time at school - at Llandaff Cathedral School, at St Peter’s prep school in Weston-super-Mare and then at Repton in Derbyshire.
Dahl’s unhappy time at school was to influence his writing greatly. He once said that what distinguished him from most other children’s writers was “this business of remembering what it was like to be young”. Roald’s childhood and schooldays are the subject of his autobiography Boy.
Since Roald Dahl’s death, his books have more than maintained their popularity. Total sales of the UK editions are around 37 million, with more than 1 million copies sold every year! Sales have grown particularly strongly in America where Dahl books are now achieving the bestselling status that curiously proved elusive during the author’s lifetime.
