David Astle’s Gargantuan Book of Words
Reviewed By Janet Mawdesley October 14, 2017
Author David Astle
Distributor: Allen and Unwin Childrens
ISBN: 9781760296223
Publisher: Allen and Unwin Childrens
Release Date: October 2017
Website: https://www.allenandunwin.com
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Well, here we go again, leaping into the unknown, the challenging and the downright incredible word of words as you have never ever known them before, or in some cases, with those really tricky words, never even realised they existed.
Take the word Gargantuan for example – well perhaps you better read just how this word came about, which is of course right at the beginning of this book, as it not at all what you might think. In fact you could say it is a coined word from so very long ago, perhaps even before dinosaurs!
In this latest mind exploding work from David Astle, he sets the challenge on every page, supposedly for children and young people, but this older person is challenged as well on some of the pages, well many of the pages to be exact, as one should be in this instance, which makes this book suitable for more than just the younger members of the family. Note to parents and grandparents; don’t let the kids know this, but just sneak off with it while they are not looking!
Each of the pages deals with a different word or set of words, disguised as puzzles, word games, quizzes and secret codes. There is even selfie slang!
There are pack animals, Rare Creatures, a Bali Bain Game, a sort of Minecraft with words, and even jigsaw puzzles which will really get the brain working. And for those children of that particular age where everything is bottom related, there is plenty there to keep them amused with Poophemisms and Chunderdome to begin with as well as meeting a farty astronaut! Phew!
You may well wonder What is the Point, but there is plenty of point, as each of the amazing pages in this fun workbook, teaches children to have fun with an incredibly complex language, creates hours of challenging undertakings which has absolutely nothing to do with computers, and is a huge and fantastic way to learn something that perhaps, maybe, you just never wanted to know, but now do anyway.
So take a journey into the wild side of the English language and have a ball! Err, maybe there is a better word than that somewhere in the dictionary or even in this book, but whatever, have an entertaining, enjoyable, amusing, exciting and pleasingly, great time. Oh, just simply have fun!
Race you to the end page!