In honor of the 50th anniversary of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, instead of picking up a copy with that egregious new cover, you can read an unpublished chapter from the early draft of the novel over at The Guardian instead.

Also from The Guardian, a companion article on the history of the book: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/30/charlie-and-the-chocolate-factory-50-years-roald-dahl-quentin-blake

Through the years there have been a lot of covers for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, including the above. In case you missed it, here's the new on from Penguin UK:

A bit strange, yes?  Yesterday at my book-loving family's get together to celebrate my mother's 85th birthday opinion ranged from "What!?" to "Probably chosen to sell more copies of the book." The whole brouhaha was discussed in a Saturday Washington Post article, "What divisive 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' covers says about books and readers." Link below:

Link