Ray Bradbury, America's most beloved storyteller, has spent a lifetime carrying readers to exhilarating and dangerous places, from dark street comers in unfamiliar cities and towns to the edge of the universe. Now, in an extraordinary flight of the imagination a half-century in the making, he takes us to a most wondrous destination: into the heart of an Eternal Family
They have lived for centuries in a house of legend and mystery in upper Illinois -- and they are not like other midwesterners. Rarely encountered in daylight hours, their children are curious and wild; their old ones have survived since before the Sphinx first sank its paws deep in Egyptian sands. And some sleep in beds with lids.
Now the house is being readied in anticipation of the gala homecoming that will gather together the farflung branches of this odd and remarkable family. In the past-midnight stillness can be detected the soft fluttering of Uncle Einars wings. From her realm of sleep, Cecy, the fairest and most special daughter, can feel the approach of many a welcome being -- shapeshifter, telepath, somnambulist, vampire -- as she flies high in the consciousness of bird and bat.
And the boy who, more than anyone, carries the burden of time on his shoulders: Timothy, the sad and different foundling son who must share it all, remember, and tell...and who, alone out of all of them, must one day age and wither and die.
By turns lyrical, wistful, poignant, and chilling, From the Dust Returned is the long-awaited new novel by the peerless Ray Bradbury -- a book that will surely be numbered among his most enduring masterworks.
Though a huge fan of Bradbury's - this one just didnt seem to "flow." To tell the truth, half the time I really had no clue what was really supposed to be going on.
It's a good premise for a story, but unfortunately I found this particular book dissapointing.
I read an interview with Ray Bradbury not so long ago, where he was talking about re-reading one of his own, older books (Dandelion Wine, I think), and he said he realized that he was never going to write anything that good again - he was amazed that he had written it. It was one of the saddest things from an author that I've heard... Unfortunately, reading this more recent book (2001), I see what he means. The book is not without its charms - but parts of it were initially written in the 1940's, others at other times, and it has a cobbled-together sort of feeling. In the past Bradbury has masterfully put together short stories to create a novel (The Martian Chronicles, for example, one of my favorite books), but this book just didn't convince me. Which is too bad, because I really like the theme - a mystical, Addams-family type group of weird characters with strange and occult talents, living semi-secretly among us regular humans... The note by Bradbury is interesting, talking about how he and Addams developed these similar ideas separately, but had talked about doing an illustrated book together - the project never came to fruition, but one of Addams' pictures is the cover art for this book. I wish they had done it, when they first talked about it.