Chocolate Touch » (REPRINT)

Born in London, Patrick Skene Catling was educated there and at Oberlin College in the United States. As a Royal Canadian Air Force navigator and as a journalist, he has traveled extensively. His present home is in the Republic of Ireland.

The original appearance of The Chocolate Touch in 1952 stirred much reviewer enthusiasm. The New York Herald Tribune remarked, "it has already proved a hilarious success with children," and The Saturday Review said, "it is told with an engaging humor that boys and girls will instantly discover and approve."

John midas loves chocolate. He loves it so much that he′ll eat it any hour of any day. He doesn′t care if he ruins his appetite. He thinks chocolate is better than any other food! But one day, after wandering into a candy store and buying a piece of their best chocolate, John finds out that there might just be such a thing as too much chocolate. . . .

Anita Barnes Lowen - Children's Literature

This title is a delicious retelling of the story of King Midas whose touch turned everything into gold. In this case, sweet loving John finds an odd coin and a strange store where he spends the coin on what he thinks will be a box of chocolate. Much to John's disappointment, the box contains only a tiny piece of plain chocolate. But what chocolate it is—the most chocolaty chocolate he has ever tasted. The next morning, John discovers that everything that touches his lips turns into chocolate—rich, sweet, smooth chocolate just like the chocolate he ate the night before. Toothpaste tubes squirt chocolate. Water fountains at school spout streams of chocolate. This is a dream come true. But even greedy John finds that too much of a good thing can quickly turn from a dream into a nightmare—especially when he kisses his mother and turns her into an unmoving chocolate statue. Is there anything John can do to reverse this horror? An entertaining and humorous tale of a boy who gets much too much of a good thing. 2006 (orig. 1952), HarperTrophy, Ages 8 to 10.