All in all, this was an engaging read. Not a Wyndham major work, but still one worth reading if you can accept the dated elements from another time. And it has now made me want to go and re-read some more Wyndham!

Chocky by John Wyndham | Goodreads

New to Penguin Modern Classics, to tie in with the release of the Steven Spielberg film, and with a new introduction by Brian AldissWhile the 1968 novel was set in an unspecified 'near future', the TV adaptation was set contemporaneously in the mid-1980s in Surrey. The Gore family acquire a second generation Citroën CX car which was marketed as being technologically advanced at the time. John Wyndham (actually John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris) is a British author who seems to be fairly unknown these days. Although The Day of the Triffids (1951) is fairly well known – in fact, the name ‘triffid’ for a large plant has become part of the English dictionary – many of those who recognise the word triffid rarely know the story from which it came. This quirky alien-meets-boy story “remains fresh and disturbing in an entirely unexpected way”—for fans of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time ( The Guardian). Wyndham described the odd rather than the fantastic, the disturbing rather than the horrific, the remarkable rather than the outrageous.”

Chocky by John Wyndham | Waterstones

In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle reads a classic story of alien possession by the master of British science fictionAlien telepathy. I mean, hello! Since light is the speed limit, the only reasonably efficient method of exploration has got to be SOMETHING ELSE. Especially if you want to send real spaceships to other intelligent races, you need to make sure you're welcome. :)