Each extract is so carefully chosen as to either quicken the heart, make you sqirm on the edge of your seat or make you laugh until your sides hurt, so much so that you are left with a need to know exactly how each adventure unfolds, how every unsavoury aunt gets her come-uppance, how every Charlie gets his winning ticket.

I love each and every Dahl story and I bought this treasury for my 6 year old son, to read with him and to read to him. I have found every extract frustratingly short. I do like the passages from Dahl about how he created characters and how he found inspirations. I much enjoyed the pieces from Ralph Steadman and Ophelia Dahl but as a treasury for an already avid fan? It is an marvellously irritating piece of marketing which I am sure will lead to most parents being led to their nearest bookstore to buy full versions of their children's favourites.