The Witches Roald Dahl

‘In fairy-tales, witches always wear silly black hats and black cloaks, and they ride on broomsticks.

But this is not a fairy-tale. This is about REAL WITCHES.’

Real witches dress in ordinary clothes, look like ordinary women, live in ordinary houses and work in ordinary jobs. Real witches, on average, squish, squiggle and make one child a week disappear. There are probably about a hundred witches still in England – maybe the woman who sat opposite you on the bus this morning, the lady who offered you a sweet in the street this afternoon, or even, just possibly, your lovely school-teacher.

Fortunately our young narrator knows a lot about the little signs, habits and signals that all witches have in common as his Grandmamma is something of a witch expert. Which is just as well, because when he accidentally stumbles upon their Annual Meeting, he is better equipped than most children to deal with a rather terrifying situation…