October Country - Softcover

Bradbury, Ray

4.12

18,772 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0586042296 ISBN 13: 9780586042298

Publisher: Harper Voyager, 1992

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A classic collection of nineteen macabre short stories from the modern master of the fantastic.

This classic collection features:

The Emissary: The faithful dog was the sick boy's only connection with the world outside – and beyond...
The Small Assassin: A fine, healthy baby boy was the new mother's dream come true – or her worst nightmare...
The Scythe: Just when his luck had run out, Drew Erickson inherited a farm from a stranger; and with the bequest came deadly responsibilities...
The Jar: A chilling story that combines love, death...and a matter of identity in a bottle of fear.
The Wonderful Death of Dudley Stone: A most remarkable case of murder – the deceased was delighted...

Plus fourteen more unforgettable tales!

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Review:

Ray Bradbury's seminal work, The October Country, is one of the most important collections of horror stories of the 20th century. Published in 1955 and composed of 19 stories written for pulp magazines at the very start of his career, these unforgettable, timeless stories have influenced a generation of contemporary writers of fear. This classic collection is actually a revamped version of the author's very first book, Dark Carnival (a much sought-after collector's item--Bradbury withdrew several stories from the original 1947 collection that even he thought too grisly). October Country contains such haunting tales as "The Lake", in which a boy faces death for the first time after losing a playmate who has drowned, and "The Small Assassin", in which a man realizes his baby is literally a born killer. "The Crowd" chillingly explains why the same people always seem to gather at automobile accidents. Although he went on to build a worldwide reputation as a master of fantasy and science fiction, if Bradbury had continued to write weird tales like this, he might instead have become one of the world's greatest horror writers. --Stanley Wiater

From the Back Cover:

Welcome to a land Ray Bradbury calls "the Undiscovered Country" of his imagination--that vast territory of ideas, concepts, notions and conceits where the stories you now hold were born. America's premier living author of short fiction, Bradbury has spent many lifetimes in this remarkable place--strolling through empty, shadow-washed fields at midnight; exploring long-forgotten rooms gathering dust behind doors bolted years ago to keep strangers locked out.. and secrets locked in. The nights are longer in this country. The cold hours of darkness move like autumn mists deeper and deeper toward winter. But the moonlight reveals great magic here--and a breathtaking vista.

The October Country is many places: a picturesque Mexican village where death is a tourist attraction; a city beneath the city where drowned lovers are silently reunited; a carnival midway where a tiny man's most cherished fantasy can be fulfilled night after night. The October Country's inhabitants live, dream, work, die--and sometimes live again--discovering, often too late, the high price of citizenship. Here a glass jar can hold memories and nightmares; a woman's newborn child can plot murder; and a man's skeleton can war against him. Here there is no escaping the dark stranger who lives upstairs...or the reaper who wields the world. Each of these stories is a wonder, imagined by an acclaimed tale-teller writing from a place shadows. But there is astonishing beauty in these shadows, born from a prose that enchants and enthralls. Ray Bradbury's The October Country is a land of metaphors that can chill like a long-after-midnight wind...as they lift the reader high above a sleeping Earth on the strange wings of Uncle Einar.

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