Front cover of an edition of Winnie's Amazing Pumpkin.
Winnie's Amazing Pumpkin (ISBN 9780192729095) is a 32-page children's picture book. The text is by the Australian-born author Valerie Thomas and the illustrations are by the Zimbabwean-born artist Korky Paul. It was first published in the United Kingdom by Oxford University Press in 2009. It was published again in 2016 under the title Winnie and Wilbur: The Amazing Pumpkin (ISBN 0192748203). It is the tenth book in the Winnie and Wilbur picture book series that started with the publication of Winnie the Witch in 1987.
The story concerns a witch named Winnie who loves vegetables of all kinds but is especially fond of pumpkins. When Winnie decides to grow her own vegetables, she is frustrated by how slowly they grow. She uses her witchcraft to make them grow more quickly. The spell works, however, as usual in the Winnie and Wilbur picture books, there are unforeseen consequences.
Plot
Winnie the Witch enjoys eating all kinds of vegetables. Her favorite vegetables are pumpkins. She makes several different pumpkin dishes for herself. Even Winnie's big black cat Wilbur enjoys eating pumpkin soup with lots of cream in it.
Each Sunday, Winnie flies to the farmer's market on her broomstick to buy vegetables. Carrying the vegetables home on a broomstick is difficult, however, and a lot of the vegetables fall off. Winnie decides that it would be better to grow vegetables herself.
The vegetables grow slowly. When they do eventually grow, they are eaten by snails and rabbits. Out of frustration, Winnie casts a spell to make the vegetables grow more quickly. They soon become huge, as do the snails, rabbits and caterpillars among them. Vines cover all of the outside of Winnie's house and a gigantic pumpkin rests on the roof. Winnie casts another spell to get the vines off her house and return everything to normal. Before she finishes saying the magic word "Abracadabra", however, the huge pumpkin falls off her roof. As a result, the pumpkin stays huge while the spell returns everything else to its right size.
Making a hole in the front of the pumpkin, Winnie takes out some of its insides to make pumpkin dishes for herself and pumpkin soup for Wilbur. There is more pumpkin than Winnie and Wilbur can eat. Winnie puts a sign in front of her house that reads, "Free pumpkin. Help yourself." A lot of people take advantage of that offer (the illustration shows other witches, wizards and vampires mixed in with ordinary people). There is soon nothing left of the pumpkin apart from an empty shell.
Winnie considers turning the pumpkin shell into a house or copying what one of her friends once did for Cinderella and turning it into a coach. She then realizes exactly what she has to do. She waves her wand and says the magic word "Abracadabra". The pumpkin shell then turns into a helicopter. Winnie thinks flying a helicopter is fun. She uses it to go to the farmer's market and is able to carry home as many pumpkins as she likes.