Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury
|
List Price: Our Price: $5.99 You Save: $13.00 (68%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $5.24 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Something Wicked This Way Comes
Book Review: Good with the bad
Summary: 3 Stars
This was a creepy, disturbing book with an ultimately hopeful ending. It was much more analytical and philosophical than I expected, thinking it would be more of a traditional horror plot without a lot more. While some of the long speeches from Will's father got a little tedious, the main point -- that evil feeds on sadness and despair and can be vanquished by happiness, laughter and love -- was excellently woven into the plot. Will and his father are great characters, juxtaposed against Mr. Dark and Mr. Cooger and even Jim, who has both light and dark in him.Book Review: Mrs. Pearson -- 2nd period
Summary: 3 Stars
The book 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' is a book about two young boys trying to find adventure, only to realize the adventure coming to them is not what they were out looking for. I think that this book teaches a valuable lesson and when looking for adventure make sure you look up the road a little futher.Book Review: Not quite what I expected
Summary: 3 Stars
This book is way smaller than I thought it would be. (5.5"x7.25") Plus the paper looks really cheap.. for some reason they put it in so that on the edge it has all different widths of paper.. looks all jagged and worn. I guess you get what you pay for though.Book Review: Not so great
Summary: 3 Stars
This book redeemed itself by being well written, which is why I gave it three stars. Other than that, it had a basically empty plot line and several loose ends that never came together.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.