Something Wicked This Way Comes

Melancholy drips from every page, every word of this story. In lesser hands, less poetic hands, the story would be nothing more than a juvenile ghost story, something uttered around a camp fire. But these are the words of one of America's premier poets and novelists, Ray Bradbury. Bradbury can haunt you and prick your heart in the course of one sentence, frighten you to the point of distraction with one phrase and cause you to ponder the dark corners of your own existence with the next phrase. The result, in this case, is a turn your lights on to read thriller which poses some of the basic questions of the human condition; questions about growing up, growing old, and death.

Will Holloway is a young boy on the verge of his teens, show more responsible and good beyond his years. His best friend, Jim Nightshade, who bears one of the best character names ever written, is the boy too young for his own taste, eager for manhood and rebellious in the face of anything standing in his way. The two are awake late one night when a carnival arrives in town, heralded by eeirie caliope music and a growing thunder storm. They watch in awe as the carnival is errected without a sound, choreographed by a dark man's mere hand movements. The boys are both drawn to the carnival and repulsed by it. As the story plays out, it becomes clear that the carnival feeds on the dark needs and desires of its customers, offering immortality without disclosing the fine print of the deal which could be servitude, madness, or death. Only Will's dad learns the magic weakness of the carnival's evil associates. The nature of the weakness points to the book's message: never loss the innocence, joy, and abandon of your youth; don't grow up to fast and never grow up altogether.

I can't comment on Bradbury's prose without breaking out into superlative langauge. Suffice it to say that Bradbury, again, achieves poetry within the confines of the narrative prose style in a way that completely eludes most writers.

Highly recommended!

5 bones!!!!! show less

Nothing up Bradbury's sleeve. Or is there?

I enjoyed this book. I like the way Bradbury develops the creepy atmosphere of the travelling carnival and how the townsfolk get pulled into its dark vortex. It's the ol' good vs. evil struggle, but not told in a trite or predictable way. And, on top of that, Bradbury's experimental writing style here is a welcome one. Well, that is until it's not.

Bradbury is a very generous writer. He wants to overshare his love for writing, tinkering, and metaphor, but it gets to the point where it's too much of a good thing. He heaps on the descriptions, and then adds onto that, and then adds on to the add-ons. Here's an example:

"Jim slipped his hand through the leather mouth and hefted forth a metal shaft

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clustered with chimeras, Chinese dragons all fang, eyeball and moss-green armour, all cross and crescent; every symbol around the world that made men safe, or seemed to, clung there, greaving the boys' hands with odd weight and meaning."

And another:

But this was like old movies, the silent theatre haunted with black-and-white ghosts, silvery mouth opening to let the moon-light smoke out, gestures made in silence so hushed you could hear the wind fizz the hair on your cheeks. More shadows rustled from the train, passing the animal cages where darkness prowled with unlit eyes and the calliope stood mute save for the faintest idiot tune the breeze piped wandering up the flues."

I appreciate the sheer verve of Bradbury's sentences, but these kinds of paragraphs pop up too often. Half the time they're aesthetically pleasing and fitting, but other times they're unwieldy and exasperating, especially as the novel goes on and the intensity of events ramp up.

It'd be more forgivable if the narrative were more ambitious, absurd, fantastical and eerie, but it's not nearly as ambitious as the writing itself is. The characters themselves are good; they effectively convey Bradbury's messages, and I found myself invested in them and the fate of their town. But Bradbury really overwrote this novel. It's a shame because his techniques are good and his style is unique, but it all loses much of its effectiveness due to repetition. show less

Two boys have their friendship and their courage tested when a sinister carnival comes to their small, late-October town. I suspect Bradbury himself may have made a dark deal with a demonic side show hustler at some point in his career, because his way with words and the stories he wields them to tell is so good it must be supernatural. Everything about this book is gorgeous: the plot is perfectly creepy without staining the comforting and nostalgic small-town setting, and the characters are perfectly drawn. The bad guys are instilled with just the right amount of pure wickedness without feeling like caricatures, and the heroes are so wonderfully human that you can feel your heart breaking for both wanting to cry for them and the show more happiness they cause in you. Will's father in particular now has a place high in the ranks of Best Fictional Fathers of All Time, right up there with Danny the Champion of the World's dad. I feel I'm gushing, but this book is worth it, as are all the Bradbury books I've read. I'm telling you folks, he really must have met a carnival of his own at some crossroads or other and given in to the temptations he has his own characters face, and so help me I'm glad he did. show less

I've never read Bradbury before, not even [b:Fahrenheit 451|17470674|Fahrenheit 451|Ray Bradbury|https://d2arxad8u2l0g7.cloudfront.net/books/1469704347s/17470674.jpg|1272463] which it seemed like everyone read in high school or university. This was selected as another spooky read, it is really meant for October, and it hits the mark wonderfully. People write about carnivals, but they seldom do it this well. People attempt to write poetic prose, but rarely succeed in the way Bradbury does. The strange thing is that his writing really struck me as the way I typically picture writer's craft teachers encouraging their students to write, with atypical word-constructions to make unfamiliar certain words or actions so that the reader really show more pays attention. I feel like they're borrowing from Bradbury in this style, except that it is so much his own that everything else is a very obvious imitation.

The only thing I take a star away for is that the women barely exist in this story. They are just wives, just gossips, or they are foolish Miss Foley, and it's all about the Special Magic of being a Boy, and I felt so strangely excluded. As if by not having a Boy's Childhood (TM) I had missed something essentially romantic and transcendental. And I know for a fact it's not true, that girls have the same magic to their childhood experiences and adventures. I also know that kids get socialised differently from a young age, and I know that Bradbury is reflecting on a childhood from a generation rather distant from my own, but that feeling of girls having no rich magical way of understanding the world in their heads that comes through a few times really rattles my bones. show less

I've read very little Bradbury ([Farhenheit 451], definitely, a long time ago; maybe some short stories?), so I was unprepared for his use of language here. The descriptions! The way he puts things! I was mad at him for being so good at it by the bottom of the first page! And the way he captures adolescence. And friendship. And the relationship between father and son and old and young. AND THE SCARY BITS. I had a nightmare, an actual nightmare, after reading this before bed. And then there's the end, the way it all gets resolved, that by rights should be kind of twee and ISN'T. I was just surprised, pleasantly, all around. Recommended.

A story of two boys who stand between their town and eternal damnation which comes in the shape of a carnival. Or something. This is like reading an epic poem, only without the rhymes. The wording and phrases are a wonder to behold. Bradbury carefully stretches, pulls and mashes his character's character into shape right before your very eyes. He draws pictures, paints sets and creates a world for you to step into, full of atmosphere and life. If I had any beef with the writing, it would be that occasionally, when he has me sitting on the edge of my seat because of the suspense, he will wander down the passages of a characters mind, meandering here and there while he explores all the possibilities. Frustrating.

Two boys have their friendship and their courage tested when a sinister carnival comes to their small, late-October town. I suspect Bradbury himself may have made a dark deal with a demonic side show hustler at some point in his career, because his way with words and the stories he wields them to tell is so good it must be supernatural. Everything about this book is gorgeous: the plot is perfectly creepy without staining the comforting and nostalgic small-town setting, and the characters are perfectly drawn. The bad guys are instilled with just the right amount of pure wickedness without feeling like caricatures, and the heroes are so wonderfully human that you can feel your heart breaking for both wanting to cry for them and the show more happiness they cause in you. Will's father in particular now has a place high in the ranks of Best Fictional Fathers of All Time, right up there with Danny the Champion of the World's dad. I feel I'm gushing, but this book is worth it, as are all the Bradbury books I've read. I'm telling you folks, he really must have met a carnival of his own at some crossroads or other and given in to the temptations he has his own characters face, and so help me I'm glad he did. show less