One of my goals in 2020 is to read more. See other books I've read or listened to here.

The second Ray Bradbury book I’ve read over the last few months, Something Wicked This Way Comes was also made into a Disney movie in 1982.

When the desire to grow up comes between two young boys on the verge of moving to manhood, their friendship is tested. When an evil soul sucking carnival arrives in town, things get worse.

I sorta kinda knew what this book was about, by pop culture osmosis, I guess. I have known people who grew up on the novel and the movie, and loved it. Although written somewhat like a young adult novel, there are many adult themes and scary parts to this book. And a lot of existential thought. As with Let’s All Kill Constance, I sometimes found Bradbury’s writing style difficult to read. In a totally different way than that novel, tho. In some ways it makes me want to read more of his books, and it some ways I never want to read another. I enjoyed the themes of the evils inside oneself: what greed, desire and envy will do to a person over time. I made sure to watch the movie after reading the book. A Disney Film from the 1980s, it was pretty slow and perhaps boring by today’s standards. But I could see, watching this at that time as a child, that it could have been very frightening. Mostly staying very true to the novel, there were a few parts where they diverged, especially in the case of Pam Grier’s performance of the side show witch. Something Wicked is, at it’s heart, a coming of age story of young men, and it seems to appeal mostly to men and boys. But I would recommend this book to anyone who likes books about circuses and sideshows, people who like books about hidden evils, coming of age stories, or books about small town adventures.

Have you read this book? Have you seen the film?