Following on from Charlie's adventures in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Charlie has been given ownership of Wonka's factory, and the Great Glass Elevator is taking Charlie and his family off to claim his prize through the roof of their house. But things don't quite go to plan, with the Great Glass Elevator going just a bit too high - out into orbit in fact.
'Did we go too far?' Charlie asked. 'Too far?' cried Mr Wonka. 'Of course we went too far! We've gone into orbit!'
WHOOSH! Inside the Great Glass Elevator, Willy Wonka, Charlie Bucket and his family are cruising a thousand feet above the chocolate factory.
They can see the whole world below them, but they're not alone. The American Space Hotel has also just launched. Lurking inside are the Vermicious Knids - the most brutal beasts in the universe!
Can Charlie and Willy Wonka stop them from destroying everything?
The text in this edition of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator was updated in 2022 for young independent readers.
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.
