Possibly my favourite book by Dahl. While it is needlessly cruel (like all his books), it catered to the nerdy book-loving kid demographic relentlessly, and that was more than fine by me. And now we even have a great Tim Minchin musical, wh

Short stories are tricky: when they rely on a twist and you see it coming, it's not all that much fun. Beware of the Dog is a short story by Roald Dahl about a WW2 pilot who loses his leg – it was alright, but (at least for me), the timin

This is a book that made me feel uncomfortable and unliked as a kid, and made me very hesitant to read any Roald Dahl ever again. Everything is gritty and dark and dangerous, and that seemed to seep into the world around me.

Disobedient children are punished. But this is not a lame traditionally cautionary tale, no: It's a dark edgy traditional cautionary tale.