The Writing Post

“That country whose people are autumn people, thinking only autumn thoughts. Whose people passing at night on the empty walks sound like rain. . . .”

Darkness is a pervasive element in many genres of fiction. This includes the overt gothic fiction of the turn of the century to more modern literature whose horror lies at the heart of their themes. These stories often features horrific hardships and truly bleak moments (Jodi Picoult, Cormac McCarthy, Anne Proulx). Some books balance between these two subtleties. One such book is Ray Bradbury’s October Country, which is a wonderfully dark short-story collection from the master of fiction himself.

Summary

To begin, there are a variety of short stories in this collection that all typically range from scary, to upsetting, to sad. Bradbury covers many themes in this collection, but these stories are a little different in execution from his usual fare, as we find that each story has a sort of macabre edge to them.

These stories include:

• A bullied dwarf who uses a funhouse mirror to make himself look taller.
• A man whose skeleton is out to get him.
• A man who revisits tragedy in his hometown by the lake.
• A crowd of people with a morbid interest in accidents.
• A family of monsters that return to their home in Illinois.

These trappings give us an invite into both Bradbury’s approach to storytelling and his insular, yet worldly outlook. the horror always starts with wonder and then becomes something far more haunting.

Conclusion

Much like The Halloween Tree or Something Wicked this Way Comes, Bradbury’s October Country gives way to not only fantastical flights of imagination, but excellent moments of tenderness and loss.

Bradbury’s writing is dear to me for its absolute strangeness and fantastical ventures into imagination. As showcased in this book, his stories are also grounded in reality and then some horrific strangeness comes through to upset the reality of the scenario. For example, the ending of “The Lake” takes the reader to a supernatural conclusion but the reality of the loss is still there. In this way, Bradbury ties both our hearts and our minds to the story.

Book Blurb

From Goodreads: “Ray Bradbury’s second short story collection is back in print, its chilling encounters with funhouse mirrors, parasitic accident-watchers, and strange poker chips intact. Both sides of Bradbury’s vaunted childhood nostalgia are also on display, in the celebratory ‘Uncle Einar,’ and haunting ‘The Lake,’ the latter a fine elegy to childhood loss. This edition features a new introduction by Bradbury, an invaluable essay on writing, wherein the author tells of his ‘Theater of Morning Voices,’ and, by inference, encourages you to listen to the same murmurings in yourself. And has any writer anywhere ever made such good use of exclamation marks!? (Illustrated by Joe Mugnaini.)”

Reviews

On Goodreads, October Country has 4.12 out of 5 stars with 19,085 ratings and 1,739 reviews. Of the five-star reviews, there are 7,287, while there are 107 one-star reviews.

Five-star reviews state that October Country is great for a “crisp, autumn morning” and is rife with “brilliant creativity in the realms of the occult.” Additionally, reviewers state that the book is filled with “solid pulp.” One-star reviews state that the book is “boring” and that it was “out there in left field.” Likewise, other reviewers felt that the stories were “melodramatic” and the writing styel was not for them.

Works Cited

Bradbury, Ray. The October Country. Ballantine Books, 1955.