"I Sing the Body Electric" by Ray Bradbury

What a title!

Bradbury gave this collection of short stories a bold title reminiscent of Walt Whitman's confident and beautiful poems. Unfortunately, for me, the book didn't live up to its title. I Love Ray Bradbury, I truly do, but this was the book of his that I've enjoyed the least (I haven't read them all yet, but I'm working on it.)

It sounds like it would be fantastic (there's even a story with a robot Abraham Lincoln for goodness sake) but it just seemed more contrived to me than his other writing.

I'm glad that I read it, but it wouldn't be the Bradbury book I'd recommend.  Instead start with "The Martian Chronicles", "Fahrenheit 451", or even "Farewell Summer".

Remembering Ray Bradbury

I meant to post the day that Ray Bradbury died. As soon as he heard, my husband called me at work to make sure that my sister and I were ok. (We work together, and also she loved Ray Bradbury more than anyone else I've ever met. In my social circles that is saying a lot. She is currently working on not just one but three Bradbury inspired quilts.)

When he died, I had two of his books siting on my bookshelf and was concurrently reading them. (My kids kept pulling them off the shelf, so I would pick up whichever short story collection I could find and keep going with it.)

Bradbury was the embodiment of an era. I'm sorry that I never had the chance to meet or even correspond with him. The writing that he left behind continues to help shape my outlook on the world. He left a legacy of creativity, nostalgia, and social critique that will continue to be not only relevant but necessary to society.

I'm looking forward to when my kids are old enough for me to give them their first paperback copy of a Bradbury.

Rest in peace Ray.

Brian Clegg

This morning I received this comment on this blog of mine:

"Thanks for your lovely comments - could I be cheeky and point out that there's more on my books at www.brianclegg.net - I'm looking forward to more 2012 entries on your blog (I agree about Bradbury's Something Wicked btw, excellently atmospheric)."

Thank you to the fantastic author Brian Clegg for noticing my post!  He can be cheeky any time he likes and I highly recommend that you all check out his actual website and buy his books!

If I could be cheeky, I would love it if Mr. Clegg ever wanted to send me another one of his books to review.

"Something Wicked This Way Comes" by Ray Bradbury

I have vague memories of an '80's movie adaptation of "Something Wicked This Way Comes".  Mostly I remember the greem mist and creepy carousel.  The movie came out when I was two, so that's about as far as my memory goes on that one.  It was enough, though, to give me an extra sense of anticipation when reading Ray Bradbury's original "Something Wicked This Way Comes".

"Something Wicked This Way Comes" is classic Ray Bradbury.  It has a story and interesting characters, but even more than that it has a mood, a vision of the world, that is fascinating.  He takes a seemingly simple story with children for main characters and makes it both child-like and utterly adult.  If you're only going to read one Ray Bradbury book (and if you read one I don't know why you wouldn't read more), then this wouldn't be the first one I'd recommend.  But if you're going to read several Ray Bradbury books, this is an enjoyable novella.

In other news, it seems that my list of Bradbury's 59 books, taken from his own official website, is lacking.  I think the list includes his original novels and collections, but there are more.  My sister is reading "A Pleasure to Burn", a collection of Bradbury's stories and writings that culminated in "Fahrenheit 451".  On Amazon I also found these books that aren't on my Ray Bradbury list:

• "Where Everything Ends" (reprints of previous novellas, plus a new short story not in other collections)
• "I Live by the Invisible" (poetry new and old)
• "Summer Morning, Summer Night" (combination of his small town stories, some are reprinted from other collections and some were previously unpublished)
• "We'll Always Have Paris: Stories" (short story collection reprinted just last year)
• "Listen to the Echoes: The Ray Bradbury Interviews" (Sam Weller's interviews of Bradbury)

Maybe I'll never get to the end of Bradbury's writings...and just maybe I'm ok with that.

"The Illustrated Man" by Ray Bradbury

"The Illustrated Man" is a collection of short stories masquerading as a novel.  Ray Bradbury is a master of short fiction, and "The Illustrated Man" plays to this strength.

There is a loose framework to the book.  The unnamed narrator meets an unusual man, the illustrated man, whose body is covered in tattoos.  These, however, are not ordinary tattoos.  These intricately detailed and vibrant tattoos change, come to life, and show the future.  Parts of his body might show you your own future, or you may see a story of the distant future.  As the illustrated man sleeps, the narrator watches his tattoos and the book is a collection of the sixteen stories that are shown during the night.

These short stories have little to connect them other than the future setting, and the sense of menace that permeates the book.  Whether it is diseased men banished to another planet, a city wreaking revenge on people, or children plotting the death of their parents, there is a deep and disturbing sense of dread throughout most of the book.  It is a representation of the future, and shows snippets of possibilities.  (Most stories seek some type of future plausibility and loosely fall in the genre of science fiction, although "The Playground" is a noticeable exception that relies on fantasy and a less logically explainable event.) 

These snippets of the future are clearly part of Bradbury's vision, and are closely related to his futuristic books like "The Martian Chronicles" and "Fahrenheit 451".  In fact, "The Other Foot" seems to carry on from a plot line introduced in "The Martian Chronicles."  These are related stories that all fit into Bradbury's unique vision of the future. 

Although it is fantastic to read, Bradbury's depiction of the future is also deeply troubling.  Although there are moments of redemption, it is a generally pessimistic view showing the atrocities (big and small) that people are capable of.

"Now and Forever" by Ray Bradbury

There's not really any rhyme or reason to my Ray Bradbury reading order.  Having decided to read all of his books, I'm just reading them as I happen to get ahold of a copy.  This time the library happened to have "Now and Forever" on the shelves.  (To anyone else in Hampshire trying to read Ray Bradbury books, I'm really sorry.  If you can't find them at the library, it's probably because they're at my house.)

"Now and Forever" is actually two unrelated stories published together.

The first is "Somewhere a Band is Playing".  This story has a feeling of timelessness which fits with the theme of the story.  Is it possible for people to stop aging?  If so, what would their lives be like?  It's a slow-paced, understated bit of writing, but I enjoyed it.

The second story is "Leviathon '99".  This story is Bradbury's scifi adaptation of "Moby Dick".  I don't regret reading it, but I'm honest enough to admit that this is my least favorite of Bradbury's work (at least that I've read so far).  I have a feeling Bradbury knew it wasn't his strongest piece as well because this story has been through a lot of different versions and revisions.  Rather than being satisfied with it, I feel like he just gave up and published it so that his time wouldn't be wasted.  As an author it's a little bit reassuring to realize that Bradbury has his off moments too, and that not every single thing he writes blows my socks off.  It makes me hope that in my very imperfect writings I'll still be able to create something meaningful and enjoyable.
Only 55 more Ray Bradbury books to go.

"Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury

What can I possibly say about Ray Bradbury's novel "Fahrenheit 451"?

If you haven't read it yet, stop whatever you're doing and go find a copy of it.  Then read.

There should be a reading list for life, and "Fahrenheit 451" should be on it.

This novel is sparse and in some ways simplistic, and yet that's part of it's power.  The futuristic world of "Fahrenheit 451" seems dramatic, and yet in many ways it's not that different from the way we live now.

Ray Bradbury: The List

Here's the list of Ray Bradbury's books:

"Ahmed and the Oblivion Machines"
"The Anthem Sprinters and Other Antics"
"Bradbury Speaks"
"Bradbury Stories"
"The Cat's Pajamas"
"A Chap-book for Burnt Out Priests, Rabbis, and Ministers"
"The Climate of Palettes"
"The Complete Poems of Ray Bradbury"
"Dandelion Wine"
"Dark Carnival"
"Death Has Lost Its Charm For Me"
"Death is a Lonely Business"
"Dinosaur Tales"
"Dogs Think That Every Day is Christmas"
"Driving Blind"
"Fahrenheit 451"
"Farewell Summer"
"Fever Dream"
"From the Dust Returned"
"The Ghosts of Forever"
"The Golden Apples of the Sun"
"A Graveyard for Lunatics"
"Green Shadows, White Whale"
"The Halloween Tree"
"The Haunted Computer and the Android Pope"
"The Homecoming"
"The Illustrated Man"
"I Sing the Body Electric!"
"The Last Circus and the Electrocution"
"Let's All Kill Constance"
"Long After Midnight"
"The Love Affair"
"The Machineries of Joy"
"The Martian Chronicles"
"A Medicine for Melancholy" (also published as "The Day It Rained Forever")
"A Memory of Murder"
"The Mummies of Guanajuato"
"Now and Forever"
"The October Country"
"One More For the Road"
"Pillar of Fire and Other Plays"
"Quicker Than the Eye"
"R is for Rocket"
"Ray Bradbury"
"Ray Bradbury on Stage"
"S is for Space"
"Something Wicked This Way Comes"
"A Sound of Thunder and Other Stories"
"The Stories of Ray Bradbury"
"Switch on the Night"
"This Attic Where the Meadow Greens"
"The Toynbee Convector"
"Twice 22"
"The Vintage Bradbury"
"When Elephants Last in the Dooryard Bloomed"
"Where Robot Mice and Robot Men Run Around in Robot Towns"
"With Cat for Comforter"
"The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit and Other Plays"
"Yestermorrow"
"Zen in the Art of Writing"

If I'm not mistaken, that's 59 books.  The man really knows how to crank them out.
2 down; 57 to go.

List compiled from information on Ray Bradbury's website.

"Farewell Summer" by Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury is probably the best American short story writer ever, and certainly one of the most prolific.  Although short stories are his preferred genre, Bradbury also wrote novellas, poems, and essays.

Inspired by my sister (who is a huge Bradbury fan), I recently read "The Martian Chronicles" for the first time, and was completely blown away by it.  I had read other things by Bradbury before, although not for years, and so expected it to be good.  What I didn't expect was how powerful of an impact it had on me, and how incredibly well written it was.  As a result, I decided to either read or re-read all of Bradbury's books that I could get my hands on.  I enjoyed reading all of Austen's works, so why not do the same with Bradbury?  Of the many obvious differences between Jane Austen and Ray Bradbury, one particularly stands out in this endeavor. 

I could count all of Austen's novels on my fingers.  Bradbury wrote a lot, dozens even.  I was going to put in a list of his books, but Google seems to hate me at the moment.  I'll try again later when the internet's more agreeable.

I started with "The Martian Chronicles".
Next I read "Farewell Summer".  My order is completely arbitrary based on what I can find in the library when I visit.  I just keep checking the "B" shelf for his books.

"Farewell Summer" is one of Bradbury's novellas, and--although it works well on its own--it is really a sequel to "Dandelion Wine".  It is genius because it accomplishes so much in so few works.  It is a sparce novella and Bradbury uses an absolute economy of words, and yet...it doesn't read like it is short.  It doesn't have the pared back feeling of Hemingway, for example.  It feels lush and atmospheric.  It seems horrible to limit it to a single title, but "Farewell Summer" is a great coming-of-age novel (no matter what age that may happen to be).

For my review of "Farewell Summer", click here.

"The Martian Chronicles" by Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury, I take my hat off to you sir.
Then I consider putting on another hat just for the sake of taking it off again.

The man is a genius. 

"The Martian Chronicles" is lyrical and beautiful, concise and profound, science fiction without being scientific.  It is more than entertaining; it is relevant.

I think everyone should read it.

It may be called "The Martian Chronicles" and set primarily on Mars, but it is an intensely human book about human nature and humanity.