Long After Midnight

After the variable and sometimes slightly unhinged previous two collections, where it was considered that he had lost his magic, he produced this collection which has always been one of my favourites. The purpose of my review here is to put in a word about the Earthlight cover design, which is so handsome and atmospheric and suits Bradbury's vision ideally. This edition is a treasure and I hope that the cover design will be kept for future editions.

I thoroughly enjoyed these short stories. They're the perfect length, each about 10 to 15 pages, just enough to build up the story and knock it over with a classic Bradbury twist. My favorite stories for far are "The Burning Man", which asks the reader to reexamine his or her own prejudices in the setting of a typical lone road hitchhiker horror story, and "The Perfect Murder" which shows that time is the ultimate judge and jury.

I must preface this review by stating that I have not read this edition but the original paperback Bantam publication from 1976. Assuming that the contents are the same, I will proceed thusly. . . This collection of 22 short pieces might prove something of a puzzle for anybody picking it up based on Bradbury's reputation as a science fiction writer. To be sure, there are stories here that fit neatly into that genre due to subject matter (robots, time travel) or setting (Mars) but Bradbury is really not a science fiction writer so much as a storyteller. This is a distinction that seems to be much more clear today than it was back in 1976 when Bradbury seemed to be stuck with the Sci-Fi type despite stories such as those found in "Long After Midnight", which are closer to literary than genre fiction even when employing science fiction devices.Perhaps a good example of the latter would be "The Messiah". This story simply yet profoundly examines the nature of religious faith via the characters of a missionary priest on Mars and a telepathic, shape changing Martian.Other pieces defy any easy classification and stand alone as simple revelations of the human condition and the mysteries of life. "Getting Through Sunday Somehow" is such a one. Bradbury's gift for poetic nostalgia is used to brilliant effect here as an American writer in Dublin, facing a gray wall of ennui, is transformed and made aware of his blessings through a bar room philosopher and a street side harp player. Bradbury, with his seemingly boundless imagination and gift for transcribing the visions of that imagination, is a treasure and these stories are literary jewels shining dark and light.

Recovering from one or two monotonous bores, "Long After Midnight" is an excellent collection of the best of Bradbury. It offers a wide variety of appeals to all audiences and all of the stories are gripping to the point that you feel like it is taking over your life and making it a part of the story. Some of the stories have such parnormality that they could easily be the storyline for an X-Files episode. Yet some are so ordinary and monotonous that it almost seems that it was an ordinary work of literature. But none of the stories in "Long After Midnight" are ordinary. All of them are written with such painstaking detail which make them spectacular. Being as it is "Long After Midnight" is a must read for almost all readers today