George's Marvelous Medicine

while i don't remember reading any of roald dahl's books when i was younger, i'm sure i did, and i'm sure that i found them amusing. even now as an adult i find this story very amusing. i love the idea of getting back at my horrid babysitters, but, as funny as this story is, i wouldn't try any of the things george did. but i have common sense. i would be very skeptical about who i let read this book. i would not let my 12-year-old nephew read because he would try it. please use caution when letting a child of any age read this book. as a parent or a teacher, you should read this book first and use your own judgement on how well you know the child that will be reading this book. if you have any doubt about wether or not the child will try this stunt, i recommend that you do not let the child read this.
george can't stand being with grandmother. she is mean and old. one day he decides to invent a 'medicine' to help cure her nastiness. the story goes on to describe the ingredients and what happens after his grandmother takes the medicine. it give lots of descriptive details on what is going on in the story.
there is only one problem with the book though, please make sure that any child that reads this book knows the difference between fact and fiction. in real life, the medicine could have some tragic consquences.
overall, great imagination, great description. i love the way that i can picture that is happening in my head. i can't wait until my son is old enough to read it.

George's grandmother is an absolutely wicked old woman, who delights in nothing more than being mean to George and making him uncomfortable. After a particularly grueling encounter with the old bat which makes him frightened, George tries to think of a way to teach his grandmother a lesson. As with so many other Dahl protagonists, he hits upon a brilliant and daring plan. He decides to replace her medication with "Georges Marvelous Medicine," which he makes by mixing up a witch's brew of household items. He knows that it's magical, but not what it will do. And that's when things get even more entertaining.

Once again, Roald Dahl has created a masterpiece that will keep children enthralled by presenting a forbidden fantasy; in this case, taking revenge on a wicked, persecuting adult who seems protected by the envelope of invulnerability that adults seem to have.

This is a very slim book, and even a casual young reader should be able to plow through it in one or two sittings. I remember that, after I read it for the first time as a boy, I coudn't put my finger on exactly what I had enjoyed so much. The plot is very simple, and I couldn't answer my own question. I finally just decided that I liked it all; every page and scene is entertaining.

Children and adults will love the humor that this book represents. While Dahl comes under fire from some parents, I feel that the tongue-in-cheek nature of the book makes itself known to children; in the same way that they know they can't throw a bucket of water on a wicked woman to melt her (ala The Wizard of Oz), they'll know that they can't be poisoning the unpleasant old people in their life. Above all, this is a fun story, and children will love to see the unpredictable effects of the magic brew that George creates.

Highly recommended.

This is one of the first books I remember reading in British primary school. I was definitely younger than 9, Amazon's "recommended reading age". I still remember the book so well.

For the reviewers who worry that little kids will copy what they read in the book (mixing together nasty potions and feeding it to a living creature), you shouldn't have to worry about that unless you've raised intensely mischevious children. I was a normal little girl and I *never* even considered copying George's outlandish stunts.

A must-read for any young child with a vivid imagination!

George's Marvelous Medicine by Roald Dahl is a fantasy story with many exaggerations. To start the story off the main character George decides to make some medicine for his grandmother so she won't be so crabby. He goes around he house collecting ingredients that go from basic ingredients all the way to very exotic ingredients. George wonders if his creation will turn out to work. George has an exciting mind that never gives up trying. This book is very hilarious in the end. In this book, George accidently gives the medicine to some other people/animals. It turns out to be a disaster. I would definitely recommend this book to any reader that likes to read comical and untrue books.

This book is the best! I read it at the daycare center where I work to children ranging from 3 years old to 13 years. Everyone loved it. I am completing my degree in elementary education, and this book is highly recommended from professors as one for children to read. The creative plot of the story and imaginative vocabulary stimulate children's minds (adults as well). If you are a parent, buy this book and either read it to your child or let him/her read it to you. If you are a teacher, use this book in your classroom. This is one book that should not go unnoticed.

I had first read this book at the age of nine in the fifth grade.
This book and Fantastic Mr. Fox were the only possible books I would read.
I absolutely adore the magic that this book has inside.
To really understand this book and comprehend it's greatness, you MUST have an imagination.
& at the age of nine, trust me, mine was overflowing (& still is :D)
To be able to get me to sit still, read a book, and love it, only Roald Dahl could do that.

I recommended this book to any person, of any age, and still do.
Now that I am twenty, I can really comprehend how wonderful this tale was.
It's imagery and laughs are definitely one of a kind.

In fact, now i'm going to go read it once more.

Enjoy your read.

I liked it when grandma drank the medicine and smoke came out of her mouth and she said I am on fire! And when they gave it to the chicken. I liked it really much. I think children 7 and up should read this book because I think you will really like it.

If you want to put it bluntly, this is not the book for impressionable youngsters or Grandma. Yet, this is a wonderfully quirky and hilarious for those who have a certainly quirky sense of humor. It is also a quick read. i could not say what its appropriate age level is because I didn't read it until I was sixteen, but mostly it is about maturity level. Super mature people probably will not like it and super immature people should not read it.

Meet George. He's young, he's bright, he's kind. He also lives at home with his horrible grandmother, a woman so awful that only the great imagination of Roald Dahl could have conceived her (she may even be WORSE than Mrs. Twit!! Hard call on that one...).
She really is terrible. "She was a selfish grumpy old woman. She had pale brown teeth and a small puckered-up mouth like a dog's bottom" (how's THAT for descriptive??). What's more, she's perfectly dreadful to George. She hurls astonishing verbal abuses at him, tells him terrible, frightening lies (like eating beetles and caterpillars is supposed to be good for him) and scares him half to death with her piercing stare and strange tales, "I know a great many secrets... Some of us know secrets that would make your hair stand straight up on end and your eyes pop out of their sockets..."
She is, in short, profoundly disgusting.
However, she is also old and feeble and requires a daily dose of brown medicine. One day, when left alone with her, George decides to cook up a NEW sort of medicine for her. So, he fetches the BIGGEST pot he can find and begins to put EVERYTHING (and I do mean EVERYTHING!) he can find into it. Including (but hardly limited to) a quart of brown glossy paint to disguise it as grandma's regular medicine.
The results are astonishing and truly Dahl. Grandma undergoes an astonishing transformation and the already-quick pace of the book gets even quicker!!
Though short, "George's Magnificent Medicine" is an absolute laugh riot the whole way through. Rarely do I laugh out loud when I read, even if the story is very funny. However, where THIS book is concerned, I was howling! Dahl's mastery of language and the illustrations by Quentin Blake make the story so vivid and alive and real, it's as if you're standing by watching the drama unfold. The pace is quick enough to keep everyone interested, even those folk who may not necessarily like to read. The slapstick action and timing of the story will keep even the most reluctant reader laughing and saying "oh, no! What next?!" Truly a wonderful book and highly recommended.

George is a small boy of eight, and when he's left all alone one day with his grouchy old grandmother, he determines to make her a new medicine to replace the medicine that she takes, which doesn't seem to do her any good. He mixes all sorts of fantastical things into the brew, from shampoo, to lipstick, to all sorts of animal medicines, to brown paint, to anti-freeze, and much more. In the real world, such a mixture would almost certainly kill you. But with Roald Dahl, anything is possible. And George's medicine ends up doing something truly marvelous...Don't worry, there are no spoilers here.

When George's mother and his rather excitable father arrive, the action rises, to a very amusing ending. George's Marvelous Medicine isn't one of my favorite Roald Dahl novels; it doesn't have as much of Dahl's rather morbid humor as some of his other books. However, it is entertaining, which is mainly the reason one reads Roald Dahl. There's not much depth, and the book doesn't make you think all that much, but it's not bad.

My favorite thing about Roald Dahl is certainly his general zaniness; not much in his books make sense, but that's part of why they're so magical and so popular even to this day. One thing I do love is the ending of this book: "George didn't say a word. He felt quite trembly. He knew something tremendous had taken place that morning. For a few brief moments he had touched with the very tips of his fingers the edge of a magic world." (pg. 89). That's how the book ends, and it's quite a good conclusion. I also loved the description of when George is boiling the medicine, on pages 27-28. Roald Dahl uses a lot of great adjectives, and some made-up words too.

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