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A vintage year

Advantages: Superb imagary evocative of summer.
Disadvantages: Recurring theme of death and loss

Although Dandelion Wine is listed under Sci Fi/ horror, it is in fact neither of these. Ray Bradbury’s novel is a nostalgic and imaginative collection of stories evoking memories of childhood experiences and discoveries. Dandelion Wine is a semi-autobiographical novel. In his introduction to the book, Bradbury explains that he did in fact construct the novel from memories of his own childhood, that he did have a best friend called John Huff and ...
...inverted pond of heaven.” Dandelion Wine is a beautiful book that should be approached as the title suggests. Sip it slowly and savour the words. It may not be all that sweet and there may be a hint of dryness in the grief and guilt but it is always sparkling with images and similies bubbling through the crystal clear writing. Even though the book was written in 1957, the story is still as relevant today. Bradbury has successfully captured the feelings ...

MAFARRIMOND 09.04.2005 · Read full review
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Review of Dandelion Wine - Ray Bradbury

War! What is it Good For? Reading!

Advantages: A fun, all-action read
Disadvantages: Slightly weak ending

I recently enjoyed Chris Bunch's "Last Legion" series, which told the story of training, combat and down time in an army marooned without help and seemingly without hope in deep space. Robert Buettner's "Orphanage" promised more of the same, although based a little closer to home, so I was greatly looking forward to it. The world is on the brink of destruction, with an unknown enemy having taken over Ganymede, one of the moons of Jupiter, and firing ...
...is one of many to lose family in one of these strikes and his reaction to this leaves him facing a tough choice; jail or the Army. In a similar fashion to the TV series "Bad Lad's Army", we follow Wander through his basic training and see how the time in the Army changes him from someone who reacts with uncontrolled violence to someone less resistant to discipline. After the ups and downs of his training, we get to see Wander play his part in attempting ...

Soho_Black 17.01.2009 · Read full review
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Review of Orphanage - Robert Buettner

Fahrenheit 451

Advantages: Entertaining
Disadvantages: None

...premise of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. In a world that has gone mad, it centres on the war between censorship and freedom of thought. The protagonist, Guy Montag is the local firefighter, and he lives in an isolated society, where the totalitarian Government have tried to control independent thinking, by banning books. The Government believe that people should be happy and carefree, and that books have a bad effect on them, by giving them ideas. ...
...assorted books, poems and plays. Fahrenheit 451 was originally published in 1950 as a short story, and was entitled, 'The Fireman'. It tells a cautionary tale of people so wrapped up in their wall to wall TV's, that they don't notice or care about issues happening for real, like poverty and warfare. None of 'that sort of thing' matters to these TV junkies, who just want more and more trivial, meaningless things to watch, in their perfect little cocoon ...

Paradis 02.11.2004 · Read full review
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Review of Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

Dinosaur happy families

Advantages: Entertaining
Disadvantages: Can wander off a little

Raptor Red is an excellent and imaginative novel that tells the colourful and exciting tale of pre-historic life through the eyes of a female 'Utahraptor'. The book was released around the time Jurassic park made Raptors into one of the most famous and feared dinosaurs. No doubt some people will have picked up a copy of the book for this reason, although I only bought it recently second hand and so can look with a little more retrospect. The novel ...
...mate and struggles to survive, dealing with hunger, flooding, hunting problems, her family unit and trying to find a new mate. The action mainly takes place from her point of view and we are treated to a wonderfully vivid and almost childlike version of the landscape. Everything is described at very base levels and you get a true sense of what it going through the Raptors head. The author also cleverly gets in a lot of information about the world ...

pdoyle007 11.09.2007 · Read full review
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Review of Raptor Red - Robert T. Bakker

Two books in one

Advantages: Readable and interesting memoir
Disadvantages: The short stories get in the way

"Green Shadows, White Whale" is an autobiographical novel, describing Bradbury's stay in Ireland to write the screenplay for the film "Moby Dick". However, as Bradbury is always more confident in the shorter form, it incorporates many of his "Irish" short stories. The result is a schizophrenic book. I found the new material, about Bradbury's relationship with John Huston and how he constructed the screenplay, fascinating. However I have never liked ...
...got in the way of a highly readable memoir. I feel that the book would have been far improved if Bradbury had abandoned his attempt at fictionalising his stay - if he had taken out the short stories, and treated the book as a genuine account of a small piece of cinema history. Nonetheless, given my disappointment at some of Bradbury's recent work, I was encouraged that it was the new material which I enjoyed, and I would still recommend the book ...

NeilHudson 10.09.2000 · Read full review
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Review of Green Shadows, White Whale - Ray Bradbury