Bedtime Stories: Something Wicked This Way Comes

something-wicked1Post by Mark T. Locker.

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.

Halloween is just a few days away! I don’t have much time left to share fabulous spooky stories with you! This one is something of a classic, though if you’re anything like me you have only been exposed to the movie version, starring Jonathan Price and some other non-Jonathan Price people. Oh, and Pam Grier. Pam Grier is in it!

Well, the movie is fantastic and is a staple of my Halloween viewing schedule. But recently I began reading Ray Bradbury’s short stories, as beautifully written as they are at times bizarre. Something Wicked This Way Comes was written in 1962 and takes on all the styles Bradbury does best: eliciting the feelings of childhood with eerie accuracy; taking on themes of darkness and creepy things; and talking about the autumn.

Jim Nightshade and William Halloway are best friends barely thirteen years old. When a mysterious carnival comes into town in the dark of night, letting fly an eerie whistle, the boys are excited and scared. There is something wrong about this carnival and cautious Will is worried but won’t let that stop him from following devil-may-care Jim to whatever lays ahead. Cooger & Dark’s Pandemonium Show, as the carnival is called, holds dark secrets that will test the boys as they discover what these attractions are doing to the unwitting adults of the town.

Gorgeously written and both scary and moving, this story of children growing into adulthood and dark and mysterious forces is a must-read any time of year, but especially at Halloween, which I’m pretty sure was Bradbury’s favorite time of year.

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