Among other stories, you’ll read about the pilot shot down in the Libyandesert, the fighter plane lost in mysterious thick cloud and the soldier whoreturns from war but has been mysteriously changed by it.
THE COMPLETE ROALD DAHLSHORT STORIES VOL 1 & 2
‘They are brutal, these stories, and yet you finishreading each one with a smile, or maybe even ahollow laugh, certainly a shiver of gratification,because the conclusion always seems so right’
Charlie Higson
In these two volumes chronologically collecting all Roald Dahl’s 55published adult short stories, written between 1944 and 1988, andintroduced by Charlie Higson and Anthony Horowitz, we see RoaldDahl’s powerful and dark imagination pen some of the most unsettlingand disquieting tales ever written.
Whether you’re young or old, once you’ve stepped into the brilliant,troubling world of Roald Dahl, you’ll never be the same again.
BOY
‘An autobiography is a book a person writes about his ownlife and it is usually full of all sorts of boring details. Thisis not an autobiography. I would never write a history ofmyself. On the other hand, throughout my young days atschool and just afterwards a number of things happenedto me that I have never forgotten . . .’
Boy is a funny, insightful and at times grotesque glimpse into the early lifeof Roald Dahl. We discover his experiences of the English public schoolsystem, the idyllic paradise of summer holidays in Norway, the pleasures(and pains) of the sweetshop, and how it is that he avoided being a Boazer.
This is the unadulterated childhood – sad and funny, macabre anddelightful – which speaks of an age which vanished with the coming ofthe Second World War.
‘A shimmering fabric of his yesterdays, the magic and the hurt’ Observer
‘As frightening and funny as his fiction’ The New York Times Book Review
‘Superbly written. A glimpse of a brilliant eccentric’ New Statesman
GOING SOLO
‘They did not think for one moment that they would findanything but a burnt-out fuselage and a charred skeleton,and they were astounded when they came upon mystill-breathing body lying in the sand nearby.’
In 1938 Roald Dahl was fresh out of school and bound for his first jobin Africa, hoping to find adventure far from home. However, he got farmore excitement than he bargained for when the outbreak of the SecondWorld War led him to join the RAF. His account of his experiences inAfrica, crashing a plane in the Western Desert, rescue and recovery fromhis horrific injuries in Alexandria, flying a Hurricane as Greece fell to theGermans, and many other daring deeds, recreates a world as bizarre andunnerving as any he wrote about in his fiction.
‘Very nearly as grotesque as his fiction. The same compulsive blend of wide-eyedinnocence and fascination with danger and horror’ Evening Standard
‘A non-stop demonstration of expert raconteurship’ The New York Times Book Review
We believe in doing good things.
That’s why ten per cent of all Roald Dahl income* goes to our charity partners. We have supported causes including: specialist children’s nurses, grants for families in need, and educational outreach programmes. Thank you for helping us to sustain this vital work.Find out more at roalddahl.com
The Roald Dahl Charitable Trust is a registered charity (no. 1119330).
*All author payments and royalty income net of third party commissions.
THE BEGINNING
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PENGUIN BOOKS
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Penguin Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
This collection originally published as Roald Dahl’s Book of Ghost Stories
First published by Jonathan Cape 1983
Published in Penguin Books 1985
Reissued in this edition, titled Fear, 2017
Selection and introduction copyright © Roald Dahl Nominee Ltd, 1983
The Acknowledgements constitute an extension of this copyright page
The moral right of the authors has been asserted
Cover artwork by Charming Baker
Just Another End, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-405-93322-3
ELIAS AND THE DRAUG
fn1 ‘The Parson at Alstadhaug’ was Peder Dass, author of Norlands Trompet, a long poem descriptive of northern Norway. He died in 1707.
fn2 Femböring, the famous Nordland fishing-boat whose form has been perfected by centuries of experimenting.
fn3 The Draug is a sea monster who sails a half-boat with a crew of men lost at sea who have not received Christian burial. He who sees the Draug, according to Nordland superstition, will soon die.
