The Humpherys Family

Danny the Champion of the World

Record Added: 4/7/2016
Author 
Illustrator 
Setting England
Topic Children's Fiction, Class
Publisher Alfred A. Knopf
ISBN 0375814256   Year 2002
Age 9-12   Pages 224
Description Brown printed binding
 
"My father, without the slightest doubt, was the most marvelous and exciting father any boy ever had." Danny feels very lucky. He adores his life with his father, living in a gypsy caravan, listening to his stories, tending their gas station, puttering around the workshop, and occasionally taking off to fly home-built gas balloons and kites. His father has raised him on his own, ever since Danny's mother died when he was four months old. Life is peaceful and wonderful... until he turns 9 and discovers his father's one vice.

Soon Danny finds himself the mastermind behind the most incredible plot ever attempted against nasty Victor Hazell, a wealthy landowner with a bad attitude. Can they pull it off? If so, Danny will truly be the champion of the world. Danny is right up to Roald Dahl's impishly brilliant standards. An intense and beautiful father-son relationship is balanced with sublegal high jinks that will have even the most rigid law-abider rooting them on. Dahl's inimitable way with words leaves the reader simultaneously satisfied and itching for more.
Notes
This is really a cute story. I enjoyed reading it while on our Northern Idaho vacation.
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