I didn't like this book very much, in fact it is probably one of my least favourite Roal Dahl's books. I am in the process of re-reading all his books, but this one was a first for me. Like everybody else, I loved Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but aside from the joy or reading about my beloved characters again, I didn't get any additional quality content from this one. The story was incoherent and episodic, the jokes trite, and it felt more like a sequel made just because than an actual, well-thought book. Definitely won't read again.

This is the sequel to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. My heavens, this was not good. This is the only Dahl book I have read to date that did not interest me in the least. It was contrived . . . and contrived badly.

The first half of the book placed our hero and Mr. Wonka in space. Yes, it was a bad Miss Frizzle episode. Horrid, I say. The premise of that part was that the elevator had gone into orbit accidentally and they had no control over returning. After bouncing around with knids and other things that go bump in the night sky, all of a sudden the elevator was capable of re-entering the atmosphere and was able to tow a spaceship with it. Remarkable!

The second half of the book was marginally better. The crew returned to the chocolate factory. Unlike the original text, this was completely boring. Too old, too young, too old, just right. Bah!

This is a daffy, half-assed attempt at continuing a fabulous story. Did you ever see Grease II? It was even worse than that!

I've read that Dahl began a third installment where the cast headed off to the White House but only completed a single chapter. I think his readers were lucky with that. Really, what is the motivation of a young English boy who now owns a marvelous chocolate factory to go to America and take in a dotty president as depicted here?

A waste of my time reading this. And to think, I am a Dahl fan! Ha!

I don't think Nina liked this one as much as the original. She had trouble paying attention until they got back to the Chocolate Factory. Verdict: Needs more candy.

This was bad. I remember reading it as a kid and thinking it was surprising. But no. It's a random and bad sequel.

Brilliant as always, Mr Dahl. It is a pleasure to read your stories.
I have loved every word of this book. What more can I say?: READ IT!

Nonsensical, dull, and lifeless. A sequel that should have never been written.

“Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator” picks up where “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” left of, but if “’Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’ is Dahl at his best…” then “Charlie and the great Glass Elevator is Dahl at his worst. However, children will still love the silliness of it all.

The best way to describe “…the Great Glass Elevator” is clumsy and inane. The Big differences between “Chocolate Factory” and “…Glass Elevator” is that former is silly with a point and congruent within itself, and the latter is pointlessly silly and seems full of discrepancies. In “…Chocolate Factory” there was a clearly developed plot and moral in amongst all that silliness, but in “…Glass Elevator” I have no idea why it went the way it did. And even though this is supposed to be a sequel, I could be wrong but there seems to be a discrepancy in the age of the grandparents. In addition the story often doesn’t seem to jive with itself. Of course there is always the giant possibility that I was so utterly bored with this book that I didn’t catch everything.

Needless to say, young children, for whom this book was intended, will probably enjoy the silly imagination of this story, but adults like me probably won’t like it so much. I think I probably wanted more chocolate factory and less outer space nonsense.

I am very sad to write this review. I had loved the first book, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, but this one is a big disappointment. Honestly, I was really bored during most of the book and it was hard to keep reading. This book has lost all the humor that was in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the jokes are absurd and impossible to understand. Also, I don’t understand what went through the author’s mind when he wrote such stupid things. I can’t believe it is the same person who wrote Matilda.

At the beginning, the glass elevator goes too high and the passengers are stuck in space. We leave the Chocolate Factory and find ourselves in an uninteresting universe. It could have been nice for one chapter, that would have made an adventure for the characters before coming back to the Chocolate Factory, but it was complete nonsense for 12 chapters! It was really ridiculous and it is such a pity. I had to wait for 12 chapters before the characters went back to the Chocolate Factory, and it is only after that that the story becomes nicer. I would have preferred a book with only around 10 chapters and all the space scenes deleted rather than feeling this book was filled with nonsense to make up for the shortness of the story. A short good novel is better than a long badly written and boring novel. Furthermore, let’s not forget this book is meant for kids and they love short books.

What I didn’t understand at all was the parallel story regarding the President of the United States. Why is it even here? Why does the author want to ridicule the President and his cabinet? Also, the novel takes place in a cold war context, since when the President sees the elevator he thinks it is a Russian spaceship and his Chief Army wants to explode it. This takes place during the space race between the Americans and Russians. Tensions with Russia and French spies are also mentioned. What I wonder is how a child who is still in primary school and who reads this book is supposed to understand this?! Honestly, I don’t see the author’s point.

This sequel and me, it just didn’t work. One book would have been enough. It is true that the last third of the novel is rather nice but it is not enough to make up for a badly-written book and a failed plot. My one piece of advice is that you should only read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory which is, by the way, an amazing book!

Los libros de Roald Dahl siempre son muy locos y en ellos puede pasar cualquier cosa, pero de los que he leído hasta ahora creo que este es el más ida de olla, sobre todo la primera parte

This was ok for a sequel, but it really lacks the fun and creativity of the first story.

DNF @25%

THIS BOOK IS SO HILARIOUS AND YOU SHOULD READ IT.