Synopsis: The children in these tales have all fallen foul of those big, shouty, snoring rule-crunching machines who make life unbearable. That's right... the GRUESOME GROWN UPS!

Review:These tales are brought to life by the expressive voice of Rupert Degas and this would be a good audio cd to  stimulate discussion  with children about reading with expression.The tales themselves have clear morals for modern times, such as eating healthly. They are well written and should get children thinking about issues in a light hearted way. The children are awful and their faults cause them to end up in all sorts of trouble. Although the grown ups are gruesome, you can understand where they are coming from and the children's perceptions of them. 

As a collection of tales they would appeal to the less squeamish 7-12 year olds. However, as an audio book I found this very hard to listen to. There was a lot of 'noise' between each tale from the keeper of the Hothell Darkness. This was very fast paced, loud and distracted  from the tales themselves. This would all appeal to children but not necessarily to parents or teachers! TGruesome Grown-ups are clever cautionary tales but overdone in the audio version.

2007-11-09