Title The Enormous Crocodile Series --- Author Roald Dahl Illustrated By Quentin Blake Publisher Bantam Books - 1984 First Printing --- 1978 Category Children Warnings None Main Characters The enormous crocodile Main Elements Anthropomorphic

In the muddiest river in Africa...lives a mean, nasty, Enormous Crocodile. All the jungle animals from Humpy-Rumpy the Hippopotamus to Muggle-Wump the Monkey to the Roly-Poly Bird, think he is filthy, horrible and fiendish. And today he's even worse than that. Today the Enormous Crocodile has secret plans and clever tricks to trap his most favorite food in all the world - little boys and girls. But the brave jungle animals have enormous suprises of their own...

Who doesn't just love Roald Dahl, his books are just insanely weird and this one is no different. The illustrations by Quentin Blake, while too childish for my liking under normal circumstances, are perfect for this book. The weirdness of the book and the strangeness of the illustrations just go so well together. I don't remember if this artist illustated other Dahl books, but these images are what come to mind when I think of the author's other novels.

What else can I say...well it isn't my favorite Roahld Dahl novel, but it is kind of cute as the crocodile tries various things to trick the children into coming close enough so he can gobble them up, though one wonders how the children don't realize that the picnic bench has teeth! And of course every time he tries he is foiled by one of the other jungle animals whom he mocked on the way to the village. Though sometimes one feels sorry for crocodiles...after all everyone loves elephants and monkeys, but are there any stories out there where the croc is the good guy?