Something Wicked This Way Comes
by Ray Bradbury
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ray BradburyEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1999-06-08
ISBN: 0380977273
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Product features:
- Mint condition in mint dust jacket
Book Reviews of Something Wicked This Way Comes
Book Review: If Only the Writing had been Better...
Summary: 2 Stars
When I heard that my book club had chosen this book for our October reading with the idea of reading a creepy, Halloween-esc story, I was thrilled. I later found out that Something Wicked This Way Comes is often considered a genre book for horror. Even better. On top of all that, Ray Bradbury is a well-known author whose works are held in high regard. I was eager to dive into the book and went in with high expectations.
I was severely disappointed.
The overall idea of the book is really quite intriguing. A creepy carnival that feeds off of its customer's inner fears and insecurities mysteriously rolls into town before Halloween. Two boys know something's not right and set out to foil the evil that has invaded their small town. There's a lot of potential for an amazing story.
However, the writing really ruined it.
The style and overall writing struck me as overly poetic, clunky, and self-indulgent. Creating a captivating, bone-chilling setting is an essential for making a good horror. However, metaphors heaped on top of analogies do not a good setting description make. There was often so much description going on that I lost track of what exactly was going on plot-wise. It always seemed like there was more happening that there actually was. There were also a lot of sentences that contained prose like "He saw. He didn't see. He thought. He didn't think. He heard. He didn't hear." At first, such prose was interesting and new. But it got really old, really fast. I respect Ray Bradbury as an author and I respect that all authors have their own, individual writing styles. However, the writing style really killed this book.
The first fifty pages or so were actually quite well done. The scene settings were captivating and the way Bradbury set the characters of the two boys up was masterful. Then, the whole thing went downhill for the next 150 pages or so. The boys became really bland and hard to relate to and the writing got so clunky and confusing that it was difficult to figure out what was going on plot-wise. The last 50 pages picked back up and ended the book solidly enough with a satisfying conclusion. It was just a matter of slogging through the middle to get there.
It really is a pity that the writing style ruined the book as much as it did because the idea behind it is truly intriguing and interesting. I haven't read a lot of Ray Bradbury's works, but I hope this is one of his worst and that his other works are far better.
Summary of Something Wicked This Way Comes
Few American novels written this century have endured in th heart and mind as has this one-Ray Bradbury's incomparable masterwork of the dark fantastic. A carnival rolls in sometime after the midnight hour on a chill Midwestern October eve, ushering in Halloween a week before its time. A calliope's shrill siren song beckons to all with a seductive promise of dreams and youth regained. In this season of dying, Cooger & Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show has come to Green Town, Illinois, to destroy every life touched by its strange and sinister mystery. And two inquisitive boys standing precariously on the brink of adulthood will soon discover the secret of the satanic raree-show's smoke, mazes, and mirrors, as they learn all too well the heavy cost of wishes -- and the stuff of nightmare.
A masterpiece of modern Gothic literature, Something Wicked This Way Comes is the memorable story of two boys, James Nightshade and William Halloway, and the evil that grips their small Midwestern town with the arrival of a "dark carnival" one Autumn midnight. How these two innocents, both age 13, save the souls of the town (as well as their own), makes for compelling reading on timeless themes. What would you do if your secret wishes could be granted by the mysterious ringmaster Mr. Dark? Bradbury excels in revealing the dark side that exists in us all, teaching us ultimately to celebrate the shadows rather than fear them. In many ways, this is a companion piece to his joyful, nostalgia-drenched Dandelion Wine, in which Bradbury presented us with one perfect summer as seen through the eyes of a 12-year-old. In Something Wicked This Way Comes, he deftly explores the fearsome delights of one perfectly terrifying, unforgettable autumn. --Stanley Wiater
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