Big George

Funny, light-hearted and moving, Big George is ‘Beauty and the Beast’ meets ‘The BFG’ and ‘E.T’. Or possibly it’s a mixture of ‘St George and the Dragon’, King Kong’ and ‘Frankenstein’s Monster’. It is 1103. Big George crash-lands on earth from space. In his own language George is a grolyhoomp; a man with blue and green hair, a giraffe-like neck and a face that glows like the moon. Aptly named, Big George is also the size of several large trees. This makes it rather difficult for Tilly, the miller’s daughter, to protect him from the rather scared and intimidated village folk whose first instinct is to run from or kill Big George. With a smattering of baddies, including the evil Baron Lousewort, Bones Lousewort (his son, who wants to marry Tilly), Silas Sludge, Bartholomew Bog and some goodies with equally unlikely names including kind-hearted poacher, Simpkins Sampkins, Big George is an energetic and enjoyable fairy tale. Very occasional line illustrations are well suited to the story.