"Don't you worry about a little thing like that!" — Willy Wonka, basically every time something catastrophically insane happens in this book, which is approximately every four minutes.
I was up way too late reorganizing my board game shelf (yes, by BGG ranking, don't judge me) and needed something light to keep me company. Three hours and fifteen minutes later, my games were still half-sorted on the floor and I was grinning like an idiot at Douglas Hodge growling his way through Vermicious Knids chasing a glass elevator through outer space. This is not how thesis progress gets made.
Dahl Rolled a Nat 20 on Chaos and a 3 on Plot
Let me be honest with you: this book is weird. And I say that as someone who has voluntarily read entire LitRPG series where the protagonist levels up by eating magical mushrooms. Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator takes everything whimsical and controlled about the first book and just... launches it into orbit. Literally. The elevator goes to space. There are shape-shifting alien predators called Vermicious Knids. Grandma Georgina gets de-aged into negative years and becomes a sort of non-entity. The President of the United States has extended phone conversations with a nanny named Miss Tibbs.
It reads like Dahl wrote it during a fever dream, and I mean that with genuine affection but also genuine confusion. The magic of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was the structure — each room, each horrible child getting their comeuppance, the steady reveal of Wonka's madness. There was a progression system, if you will. (See, I can tie anything back to game design.) This sequel throws structure out the window and just vibes. Sometimes that works brilliantly — the Knids sequence is genuinely tense and funny — and sometimes you're sitting there going, "Wait, what is happening and why do I care?"
For a 3-hour listen, the pacing never truly drags, but the second half especially meanders. Dahl's satirical jabs at politicians and bureaucracy are fun if you're an adult catching the subtext, but they might fly right over younger listeners' heads. My D&D group would love the Knids as a monster encounter, though. Amorphous alien shapeshifters that spell out rude words? That's going straight into my homebrew campaign. The Tower of Nero has that same chaotic-monster-of-the-week energy that would slot perfectly into a one-shot, for what it's worth.
Douglas Hodge Is Doing the Heavy Lifting (And He Knows It)
Here's the thing — this audiobook works almost entirely because of Douglas Hodge, and he seems to understand that. His Wonka is electric, all manic enthusiasm pitched just this side of unhinged. But where he really earns it is the contrast work. The grandparents get these wheezy, creaky voices — Grandma Georgina's simpering complaints versus Grandpa Joe's earnest warmth — and then Hodge will snap into the booming pomposity of the President and it's like a completely different performer showed up.
The Knid chase sequence is where his energy peaks. He doesn't just narrate it; he performs it, with growls and shifts in tempo that turn what could be a confusing action scene into something genuinely exciting. His comedic timing on Dahl's more absurd lines — the Wonka-Vita pill sequences, the ridiculous Oompa-Loompa songs — is sharp. He knows exactly when to pause for the joke to land.
Is it Steven Pacey? No. Steven Pacey walked so other narrators could run, and we all know that. But Hodge is doing something specific and appropriate here — he's matching Dahl's chaotic energy beat for beat, and for a children's book, that's exactly what you need. He's not trying to give you a subtle, layered dramatic reading. He's giving you a one-man show, and it's a blast.
Who's Rolling Initiative on This One
If you've got kids between 6 and 10 and they loved the first Charlie book, this is an easy win for car rides. Hodge will keep them locked in. If you're an adult Dahl completionist, it's a fun, short listen — just calibrate your expectations. This isn't the tight, satisfying narrative of Chocolate Factory. It's the weird bonus level you unlock after beating the game where the rules stop making sense but the art direction is still incredible.
If you need a story to go somewhere meaningful? If you want character arcs? Skip this one. Charlie barely has a personality here. Wonka is the whole show.
The Elevator Goes Up, But Not That High
I enjoyed this more than I expected, and less than I hoped. At 3 hours 15 minutes, it's the audiobook equivalent of a fun one-shot campaign — low commitment, high energy, not a lot of depth. Hodge's performance elevates (pun intended, not sorry) material that's honestly B-tier Dahl into something genuinely entertaining. I read this instead of writing my thesis, and for once, I only slightly regret it. The progression isn't satisfying the way Chocolate Factory's was, but sometimes you just want to watch a glass elevator fight aliens in space. And honestly? That's fine.
