One More For The Road by Ray Bradbury
01/05/2003 . Source: Paul Skevington 

Pub: Earthlight/Simon and Schuster. 290 page paperback. Price: £ 6.99 (UK). ISBN: 0-7434-4074-9

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There are times when one looks back at seemingly innocuous moments in our past lives and begin to think of them as events holding considerably greater significance that we at first suspected. This happened to me recently when I was given the opportunity to review the paperback edition of Bradbury's 'One More for the Road'.

As I thoughtfully thumbed through the first few pages, I began to remember a time from my early school years when I had been poised indecisively beside one of those revolving bookstands, the ones that unfailingly manage to cause unspeakable damage to their contents as they are carelessly wedged into the tight shelves.

The stand seemed even more impressive to me then, a gigantic oracle of adventure to a short young lad with a growing taste for fantasy. I was trying to decide between two novels that had caught my attention.

One was 'The Dark Half' by Stephen King, typical fare for me back then. The other was an intriguing little book with a strange illustration on the front, a depiction of a torturous ghostly monster set against an alien looking background. It was 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' by Ray Bradbury. Needless to say, I went with the King. At age 12, there was no competition for me between an almost guaranteed wild ride and the enticements of some strange unknown author.

Although I do remember that I did enjoy 'The Dark Half' considerably, having read this heart-rending collection of Bradbury's superbly crafted work I do wish that I had been a little less conservative in my tastes and had chosen to start reading someone who is undoubtedly one of the finest authors still working today.

'One More for the Road' is a collection of stories both previously published and entirely new. It is an exciting chance to read work from all periods of Bradbury's career, and to become aware of the developmental tangents that Bradbury has flown down as his experience increased.

It is interesting to see that there is no diminishment in the quality of his writing as has been suggested from other sources. Indeed, the quality of the newer stories actually improves. New and old, all of the tales fit carefully into a collection that has been deliberately sculptured around a few key themes.

The driving concepts are ones that haunt and occupy us all. Bradbury deals with the realities of the ageing process, memory, love and loss and how all of these entangle with each other to create our own personal histories. I think personal is a very good way to describe Bradbury's work.

It is personal not just to himself but also to all of us, in a very emotional and human way. He works on the micro and not the macroscopic scale, dealing with larger events by shedding light on the inner workings of the soul. Having reached the age of 83, Bradbury lends these tales of the passage of time a sense of authority that no younger author could achieve.

In the story 'Tangerine', a man goes to a restaurant and meets an acquaintance from a time long past that reminds him of a charismatic man he once knew and perhaps loved. It is a tale of youth and tragedy and the sweet pain of remembrance, as is 'Autumn Afternoon' which tells us that sometimes it is easier to forget.

You won't spend all of your time looking sombre though as tales such as 'The Cricket In The Hearth' and the title story 'One More For The Road' will have you grinning like a certain cat of a Cheshire-like appearance. The strength of these stories lies in the fact that although packed with conceptual brilliance they elicit genuine emotional responses altogether alien to the marionette like tuggings of a Spielberg movie.

Also, it is fascinating to read the work of a man so secure in his art who tells his tales from the other end of the human life perspective. While age is celebrated, Bradbury also rejoices in youthfulness as seen in the story 'With Smiles As Wide As Summer', which successfully captures that moment in time where a boy might spend ages playing with dogs as companions and feel true joy in a day that could last forever.

Stories like 'Quid Pro Quo' and 'The F. Scott/Tolstoy/Ahab Accumulator’ go one step further than this and manage to bridge the gap between age and youth by examining alternative uses for a time machine.

What if a time machine were built and were not used for grand schemes such as killing Hitler (or hooking your mother back up with your father!) but for smaller more essential things, such as saving the potential of a failed man or easing the pain of past artists who suffered, never knowing that one day they would be recognised for their greatness. These are motivations that we don't just understand on a cold scientific level, we relate to them as human beings.

The highlight of the collection is for me, the story 'Time Intervening' which says everything about humanity's difficult journey through this life that you could wish for, in a matter of a few pages.

The only time Bradbury falters are in the more consciously experimental stories such as 'Beasts' which managed to lose me in it overtly abstract meanderings. In a collection of this size though it is impressive to have only one story that left me blinking in mildly bemused confusion.

So in the next few weeks, if you see me pausing by the 'B' section of the fantasy shelves in your local bookstore you know what book I'm picking up. And about time, too.

Paul Skevington