My daughter asked to read the book and after checking out the reading level I told her that it might be a little hard so if she thought it was too hard she should quit reading it. She was not deterred by the difficulty of the book because she enjoyed the story so much. She really liked the descriptions throughout the book which made it exciting. She was so excited as to what was going to happen next that she read this book outside her normal reading time and finished it very quickly.
Appropriateness: This is Dahl so there are some things that are a little twisted so if you have an easily disturbed child they might be bothered, most kids won't have any problem (if they can handle spiderman they can handle Dahl).. This is a fantastic book for advanced readers. It's full of adventure and fun and age appropriate (content wise) for all elementary aged readers but it is filled with poetry and difficult vocabulary words. Like other Dahl books the reading levels vary based on which system you use, the grade equivalent is 6.7, lexile 840 (putting it at a fifth grade level) and the guided reading level is Q. I would recommend this book as a read aloud for second grade and up an as a read to self for kids that read above a fourth grade level.
This book is on the banned book list for a lot of absurd reasons. You can read a great article here on the book and the controversy. Most of the books on that list are fantastic, so use the list to get your kid pumped about reading a banned book.
There is a movie version of the book that is great when your child finishes the book that my daughter also enjoyed that we rented from netflix when she finished the book.
