Rating: 4/5
Mr Hoppy was a lonely man who lived in a flat above a lovely widow lady called Mrs Silver. He loved her with all his heart, but he had never managed to conquer his courage to ask her to tea, or something minor like that. What made him most jealous, however, was that Mrs Silver already seemed to have the love of her life; Alfie, a tiny pet tortoise who she adored. He even had a house where he could hibernate and sleep for the night on the balcony, and was fed tender, juicy lettuce leaves every day with sliced tomatoes and crispy celery. One day, Mrs Silver complained that he was too small. Mr Hoppy made up that if you chanted backward words saying things like ‘Grow! I said grow!’ he would eventually grow. So when Mrs Silver was at her part-time job, he stealthily took Alfie and replaced him with larger tortoise from the pet shop.
Every week, when the lovely woman chanted the long script of words, Mr Hoppy would replace Alfie with another, slightly large tortoise. When the kind lady realised that the trick was working, she finally embraced the startled and joyful man, and soon they married and both were happy and were never lonely again.