Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, by Ian Fleming

Like most kids of my generation, I have seen the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang many times.  I recently took my family to see a stage production of it at a local church (it was fabulous!) and got to thinking that I have never read Ian Fleming's novel, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang: The Magical Car on which the movie was based.  Actually, as I learned upon reading the book, the movie is very loosely based on the novel.

Caractacus Pott and his lovely children, Jeremy and Jemimah, are clearly the same characters we know from the movie.  However, Fleming, who I wouldn't have thought would be a big family man, includes Mrs. Pott, rather than the lovely Truly Scrumptious.  (First of all, I was a little disappointed that Truly Scrumptious was not a Fleming creation.  That is a perfect name for a Bond girl.  Second, in the novel, it's "Skrumshus," but in the movie it's "Scrumptious."   I wonder why.)  Together they use the proceeds from selling the whistle candy to Lord Skrumshus to buy the broken down racing car that comes to be known as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.  On their first outing, on the way to the sea shore, the Pott family gets stuck in traffic.  Mr. Pott notices a blinking light on the control panel, follows the directions, and off they go, flying over the city, out to a sandbar in the English channel to enjoy a picnic.

When the tide comes in, another flashing light directs Pott to a different lever, which transforms the car into a hovercraft.  So far, the story seems much like the movie, but after this point, the divergence is almost complete.  Rather than Vulgaria, the spies, the hidden children, and the child catcher, the Potts find a cave where a criminal gang has stored their arsenal.  After the Potts blow it up, the criminals kidnap the Potts children to use them as bait in a heist.  Chitty knows what's going on, though, and saves the day.

I hesitate to compare the book and the movie.  The stories are so drastically different that you really have to view them as two separate works.  The book has merits of its own, though.  It's a perfect bedtime story, with cliffhangers that will leave young listeners eager to resume the story the next day.  It's a lovable car and a delightful story that deserves to be a classic all on its own, classic movie or not.