I always had a soft spot for The Halloween Tree, but it's been ages since I read it.

I'm reading Something Wicked This Way Comes on my commute and it's reminding me how evocative Bradbury's language is, but also how distinctive his style is. He takes some big chances with the figurative language, pulling odd but apt comparisons into his similes and metaphors. He also has a lot of storyteller phrasings, as if he's telling it to you aloud.

Jilli, remember when I did an LJ post at the proto-goth early sixties? I should've added this to the list. It came out in 1962. Same year as We Have Always Lived In the Castle, as well as the American release of Eyes Without a Face. The movie version of The Haunting came out in 1963.

There's a new book out about the golden age of publishing in America (roughly post-war to early eighties) with chapters on all the main publishing houses and their style and their editors.

They have a sidebar on the guy who single handedly created the Gothic Romance sub-genre. He basically asked his mother-in-law why she kept re-reading Rebecca. She said they don't write them like that anymore and he decided that people should write them like that some more. So he used Rebecca and Jane Eyre as his models, and he worked out all the cover tropes and they were a big hit through the early sixties.

Jilli, remember when I did an LJ post at the proto-goth early sixties? I should've added this to the list. It came out in 1962. Same year as We Have Always Lived In the Castle, as well as the American release of Eyes Without a Face. The movie version of The Haunting came out in 1963.

Oh, SWTWC totally belongs on a Goth influences list. I wish someone would do a really good audiobook version of it. (I know there is one, but the snippets I've heard from it don't impress me.)

They have a sidebar on the guy who single handedly created the Gothic Romance sub-genre. He basically asked his mother-in-law why she kept re-reading Rebecca. She said they don't write them like that anymore and he decided that people should write them like that some more. So he used Rebecca and Jane Eyre as his models, and he worked out all the cover tropes and they were a big hit through the early sixties.

That's so cool! I've been getting into Gothic Romances as brain candy fluff books.

screeches into thread: Yearlong Poe Celebration, 2009

also? one of the toll booth operators I passed the other day was reading a book - I asked which one (slow toll) and she said "Twilight!" So me: "twinkly vampires?" Her: Yes! Isn't it wonderful?

I don't think downshifting them from sparkly to twinkly is destructive, per se. But it can't help. And I'll do that all I can.

Anybody here familiar with the Boileau-Narcejac writing team?

They're the french writers who wrote Vertigo, the screenplay for Diabolique and the screenplay for Eyes Without a Face.

That's a pretty good resume.

the screenplay for Eyes Without a Face.

oh, dang, now that frickin' Billy Idol song will be stuck in my head for the rest of the day.

I've never read Something Wicked This Way Comes . I wonder if it would freak my shit out too much.

I read a really bizarre novel of theirs called (in translation) Choice Cuts.

Heh. I texted my little sister ( a bookseller) and was all "The internet is crackier than normal! I can't walk away!"

She's all calm: "I'm ignoring it. A new Robb, Kenyob and Hamilton all dropped today."

Me (temporarily diverted): Gentry or Anita?

Sis: Gentry. She hasn't slept with anyone is 160 pages!

Me: Did she die? (Would that stop her?)

Did she die? (Would that stop her?)

Granted I've only read the Anita Blakes, but I'm going to go with a no. It doesn't seem to stop most of Anita's acquaintances.

I have spoilers for the sexin' (my sis MAY read as fast as I do. Almost. Heh.)

She said no sexin till page 344 (I think 344).And Merry only had actual sporkin; with one person. Some foreplay, but monogamous sporkin'. She was doing a read and post, sex-wise. It kept me entertained.

She intimated there was ACTUAL PLOT.

It's a night of miracles.