Ray Bradbury was long the most influential sci-fi writer in the world, the poetic and visionary author of such classics as Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, and The Illustrated Man

But he also lived a fascinating life outside the parameters of sci-fi, and was a masterful raconteur of his own story, as he reveals in his wide-ranging and in-depth final interview with his acclaimed biographer, Sam Weller. After moving to Los Angeles, he became an inveterate fanboy of movie stars, spending hours waiting at studio gates to get autographs. He would later get to know many of Hollywood’s most powerful figures when he became a major screenwriter, and he details here what it was like to work for legendary directors such as John Huston and Alfred Hitchcock. And then there are all the celebrities—from heads of state like Mikhail Gorbachev to rock stars like David Bowie and the members of Kiss—who went out of their way to arrange encounters with Bradbury.

But throughout that last talk, as well as the interviews collected here from earlier in his career, Bradbury constantly twists the elements of his life into a discussion of the influences and creative processes behind his remarkable developments and inventions for the literary form he mastered. Mixed with cheerful gossiping about his travels and the characters of his life, it makes for a rich reading experience and a revealing collection of interviews.

The people of Earth are preparing for war—a war that could potentially destroy the planet. Explorers are sent to Mars to find a new place for humans to colonize. Bradbury's Mars is a place of hope, dreams, and metaphor—of crystal pillars and fossil seas—where a fine dust settles on the great empty cities of a silently destroyed civilization. It is here the invaders have come to despoil and commercialize, to grow and to learn—first a trickle, then a torrent, rushing from a world with no future toward a promise of tomorrow. The Earthman conquers Mars...and then is conquered by it, lulled by dangerous lies of comfort and familiarity, and enchanted by the lingering glamour of an ancient, mysterious native race.

Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles is presented here as a full cast audio production with an original music score and thousands of sound effects by the award winning Colonial Radio Theatre on the Air. It marks their fourth collaboration with one of the most celebrated fiction writers of our time—Ray Bradbury.

Joe Orlando was a mainstay at EC, especially on science fiction, and this collects 23 of his best sf stories. All of them, most scripted by Al Feldstein, serve up classic O. Henry-style endings, such as “I, Robot,” and “Fallen Idol.” The title story is one of EC’s most famous, with its blunt anti-racism message. When it was printed during the era of the Comics Code, publisher Bill Gaines and Feldstein had to fight to keep the story’s final panel “reveal” (and thus its whole point) intact. It was a Pyrrhic victory, however, as “Judgment Day” became the last story in the last comic book EC published. This volume also features two of Orlando’s outstanding adaptations of classic Ray Bradbury science fiction stories: “The Long Year” and “Outcast of the Stars.” Also included are all of EC’s “Adam Link” adaptations, a series which was later also adapted for The Outer Limits TV show and featured Leonard Nimoy.

With his wholesome approach, Jack Kamen stood out amongst the grandguignol grunge, gritty realism, or futuristic dazzle of his fellow EC cartoonists — but his brilliant editor/writer Al Feldstein found a way to exploit the surface innocence of his style with seemingly nice stories of romance gone horribly wrong, or future fantasies with an unexpectedly brutal twist. And nowhere did Kamen’s clean-but-lush graphics work better than in the stories he created for EC’s science-fiction comics. The title story, “Zero Hour” (one of three in this book adapted from works by Ray Bradbury), set in a Spielbergian suburban idyll, is particularly well served by Kamen’s surface innocence; “A Lesson in Anatomy” works similar magic, with its Mayberry-esque setting veering into alien-invasion terror. If there was any devil in Kamen, it came out in his loving depiction of the female face and form, and you could see why his hapless heroes were often fatally entranced with them — as in “Punishment Without Crime” (Bradbury again), “He Who Waits!” (a scientist finds an extreme way of rejoining his eight-inch-tall inamorata), and “Miscalculation!” (the lucky recipient of a package from the future literally brews his own harem); even the supercomputer in “Only Human!” proves vulnerable to a beautiful woman’s charms. Zero Hour And Other Stories contains 22 classic EC yarns — plus the usual all-new biographical, historical, and critical essays that have made Fantagraphics’ EC Library series the ultimate version of these classics.

Even 60 years after their original release,in an era ofexplicit horror, EC Comics superstarGraham “Ghastly” Ingels’s grisly pagesretain the power to shock.His loving depictions of the endlesscorruption of flesh and nature madehim the go-to guy for stories involving swamps,maniacs, and dismemberment— and all three combined to best effectin one of the standouts of this collectionof his stories: “Horror We? How’sBayou?” — considered the single mostspectacularly drawn of all of EC’shorror stories, with a climax that would givebody-horror king David Cronenbergnightmares.Ingels specialized in depicting theunimaginable. If you ever wondered whatthe vengeful, decaying corpse of anelephant stomping a woman to death wouldlook like, it’s in here(“Squash...Anyone?”). Or living rats sewn into the bodiesof a tyrannical king and queen (“A GrimFairy Tale”)... or the results of injectinga “poison-pen” letter writer withliteral poison and reducing him to, in the words of Al Feldstein’s script, a“foul-smelling,oozing pool of putrescence” (“Notes toYou!”). One of the two Ray Bradbury adaptations in the book, “There Was anOld Woman” (about a deceased crone whosimplyrefuses to stay dead) provides theclosest thing to anote of sweetness that you’ll find here— perhapswith the exception of the genuinelyromantic “ALittle Stranger!” and its lovingmarriage between adead vampire and a dead werewolf.Sucker BaitAnd Other Stories features 25classicstories from Tales From the Crypt, Shock Suspen-Stories, Vaultof Horror, and Ingels and his “OldWitch” character’s special showcase Haunt of Fear— plus the usual fascinating historical,critical,and biographical material.

'Molti dei racconti che leggerete si sono impossessati di me in questo o quel momento, e non mi hanno lasciato libero finché non li ho inchiodati alla pagina.' Così Ray Bradbury descrive la genesi dei testi racchiusi nel 'Pigiama del gatto', l'ultima raccolta da lui pubblicata. Sono venti storie, più un prologo e un epilogo, venti gemme del tesoro d'immaginazione chiuso nella geniale mente letteraria dell'autore di 'Fahrenheit 451'. In questi racconti, scritti in un lungo arco di tempo e ambientati tra il passato prossimo e un indefinito futuro, Bradbury rende omaggio ai grandi scrittori che l'hanno ispirato, da Fitzgerald a Melville, da Poe a Wilde, e trascina il lettore nel suo mondo fatto di amicizie, delusioni, paura, viaggi nel tempo, vecchie dimore e artisti perduti. Ci narra di senatori ubriachi che perdono al gioco nientemeno che gli Stati Uniti; di coppie di sposini che si trovano a mettere a dura prova la loro idilliaca relazione; di misteriosi stranieri che terrorizzano il vicinato con inaudite urla notturne; di donne solitarie pronte a cogliere l'ultima occasione per amare. La quotidianità dell' American way of life, o quasi, ma osservata con l'occhio indagatore di Bradbury, che sa renderla sempre sorprendente.

FAHRENHEIT 451 - BRADBURY RAY - Sodis

Surrounded by the ornate, retro, proto-splatter horror graphics of Jack Davis and Graham Ingels and the slick, futuristic sci-fi stylings of Wally Wood and Al Williamson, EC Comics superstar Johnny Craig stood out in the 1950s with his elegant, crisp, contemporary graphic style. And nowhere did this style work more beautifully than in the dozens of superb crime and horror comics he wrote and drew for EC,mostly for the two comics he also edited, Crime SuspenStories and The Vault of Horror. (Craig was the only EC artist to habitually write his own material for the entire length of EC's run.) Featuring murderous husbands and wives, executioners, thieving surgeons, vengeful sword-swallowers, time bombs, private dicks, vampires, werewolves, and ghouls, the 23 stories in this book comprise a perfect encapsulation of the very best and darkest kind of noir and horror writing, stunningly executed (in more than one sense of the word) by one of the great cartoonists of his (or any) era. And all in seven or eight pages per story! Fall Guy For Murder And Other Stories is once again, as are the other EC Comic Library releases, supplemented with several fascinating essays and informative historical notes on the stories.

Other Worlds, the fourth volume in Jon Scieszka’s Guys Read anthology series for tween boys, features ten thrilling new tales of science fiction and fantasy from some of the biggest names in children’s literature.

Prepare yourself for ten trips into the unknown, as ten of your favorite writers—Rick Riordan, who has written an all-new and exclusive Percy Jackson tale, Tom Angleberger of Origami Yoda fame, Newbery medalist Rebecca Stead, Shannon Hale, D. J. MacHale, Eric Nylund, Kenneth Oppel, Neal Shusterman, Shaun Tan, and none other than the late Ray Bradbury—spin tales of fantasy and science fiction the likes of which you have never imagined.

Compiled by National Ambassador for Children’s Literature (and Secret Ambassador for the Intergalactic Alliance) Jon Scieszka, Guys Read: Other Worlds is sure to boldly take you where no reader has gone before.

Other Worlds, the fourth volume in Jon Scieszka’s Guys Read anthology series for tween boys, features ten thrilling new tales of science fiction and fantasy from some of the biggest names in children’s literature.

Prepare yourself for ten trips into the unknown, as ten of your favorite writers—Rick Riordan, who has written an all-new and exclusive Percy Jackson tale, Tom Angleberger of Origami Yoda fame, Newbery medalist Rebecca Stead, Shannon Hale, D. J. MacHale, Eric Nylund, Kenneth Oppel, Neal Shusterman, Shaun Tan, and none other than the late Ray Bradbury—spin tales of fantasy and science fiction the likes of which you have never imagined.

Compiled by National Ambassador for Children’s Literature (and Secret Ambassador for the Intergalactic Alliance) Jon Scieszka, Guys Read: Other Worlds is sure to boldly take you where no reader has gone before.

Marty Sklar was hired by The Walt Disney Company after his junior year at UCLA, and began his Disney career at Disneyland in July 1955, the month before the park opened. He spent his first decade at Disney as “the kid,” the very youngest of the creative team Walt had assembled at WED Enterprises. But despite his youth, his talents propelled him forward into substantial responsibility: he became Walt’s speech writer, penned Walt’s and Roy’s messages in the company’s annual report, composed most of the publicity and marketing materials for Disneyland, conceived presentations for the U.S. government, devised initiatives to obtain sponsors to enable new Disneyland developments, and wrote a twenty-four-minute film expressing Walt’s philosophy for the Walt Disney World project and Epcot. He was Walt’s literary right-hand man.

Over the next forty years, Marty Sklar rose to become president and principal creative executive of Walt Disney Imagineering, and he devoted his entire career to creating, enhancing, and expanding Walt’s magical empire. This beautifully written and enlightening book is Marty’s own retelling of his epic Disney journey, a grand adventure that lasted over half a century.

I cento racconti inclusi in questa antologia - scelti dallo stesso autore per il volume pubblicato nel 1980 da Knopf con il titolo The stories of Ray Bradbury - costituiscono una scelta assai rappresentativa della straordinaria produzione narrativa di Bradbury, che nella sua lunghissima e prolifica carriera ha esplorato i generi più disparati. Accanto ai racconti propriamente fantascientifici - tra guerre di mondi, scenari postatomici, marziani che vivono in dimore incandescenti piene di libri che parlano appena vengono sfiorati, ma anche terrestri che lasciano la Terra per colonizzare altri pianeti e fondare nuove civiltà - non mancano infatti racconti polizieschi, noir, fantasy e horror. Ben rappresentato nel volume è poi il Bradbury cantore della provincia americana, con una serie di celeberrimi racconti in cui le atmosfere della small-town sono ritratte con sguardo insieme feroce e struggente, e una forte componente autobiografica. Altro tema potente delle sue short stories è infatti la rievocazione dell'infanzia e dell'adolescenza, viste come un tempo incantato, dominato da grandi passioni letterarie (Poe, Dickens, Twain e Steinbeck su tutti), e dall'amore per il cinema, specialmente per i primi effetti speciali che raccontavano la conquista dello spazio con un misto di ingenuità ed entusiasmo.

This collection of thirty-eight terrifying tales of serial killers at large, written by the great masters of the genre, plumbs the horrifying depths of a deranged mind and the forces of evil that compel a human being to murder, gruesomely and methodically, over and over again.

From Hannibal Lecter (The Silence of the Lambs) to Patrick Bateman (American Psycho), stories of serial killers and psychos loom large and menacing in our collective psyche. Tales of their grisly conquests have kept us cowering under the covers, but still turning the pages.

Psychos is the first book to collect in a single volume the scariest and most well-crafted fictional works about these deranged killers. Some of the stories are classics, the best that the genre has to offer, by renowned writers such as Neil Gaiman, Amelia Beamer, Robert Bloch, and Thomas Harris. Other selections are from the latest and most promising crop of new authors.

John Skipp, who is also the editor of Zombies, Demons and Werewolves and Shapeshifters, provides fascinating insight, through two nonfiction essays, into our insatiable obsession with serial killers and how these madmen are portrayed in popular culture. Resources at the end of the book includes lists of the genre's best long-form fiction, movies, websites, and writers.

Ray Bradbury brings wonders alive. For this peerless American storyteller, the most bewitching force in the universe is human nature. In these eighteen startling tales unfolding across a canvas of tattooed skin, living cities take their vengeance, technology awakens the most primal natural instincts, and dreams are carried aloft in junkyard rockets. Provocative and powerful, The Illustrated Man is a kaleidoscopic blending of magic, imagination, and truth—as exhilarating as interplanetary travel, as maddening as a walk in a million-year rain, and as comforting as simple, familiar rituals on the last night of the world.

In The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury, America's preeminent storyteller, imagines a place of hope, dreams, and metaphor— of crystal pillars and fossil seas—where a fine dust settles on the great empty cities of a vanished, devastated civilization. Earthmen conquer Mars and then are conquered by it, lulled by dangerous lies of comfort and familiarity, and enchanted by the lingering glamour of an ancient, mysterious native race. In this classic work of fiction, Bradbury exposes our ambitions, weaknesses, and ignorance in a strange and breathtaking world where man does not belong.

FAHRENHEIT 451 - BRADBURY RAY - Simon&Schuster

Sixteen vintage stories and novellas show the evolution of the images, ideas, and social concerns to be found in the author's classic of modern science fiction, 'Fahrenheit 451.'

Sixteen vintage stories and novellas show the evolution of the images, ideas, and social concerns to be found in the author's classic of modern science fiction, 'Fahrenheit 451.'

Ray Bradbury's internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of twentieth-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future.

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden.

Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.” But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn't live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television.

When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.

Ray Bradbury's internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of twentieth-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future.

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden.

Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.” But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn't live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television.

When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.

Ora e per sempre raccoglie due racconti che rappresentano, ciascuno in modo differente, il cuore della poetica di Ray Bradbury, maestro dall'incomparabile talento e dall'irrefrenabile creatività, che con i suoi romanzi ha trasformato il paesaggio letterario americano. In 'Da qualche parte suona un'orchestrina' uno scrittore è attirato da poesie e da sogni nel minuscolo villaggio di Summerton, Arizona, dove non ci sono bambini piccoli e i cui abitanti sembrano non invecchiare mai. Ipnotizzato dalla fortissima magia rurale e da una bellissima ed enigmatica donna che porta il nome di una regina egizia, lo scrittore scoprirà ben presto che la comunità nasconde un segreto, tramandato per secoli all'insaputa del resto dell'umanità. Un segreto che ha a che fare con i libri e le storie, e che va svelato prima dell'arrivo di una spietata distruzione. Con 'Leviatano '99', Bradbury ritorna nel cosmo per reinventare il capolavoro di Herman Melville, incentrato su ossessioni e mari aperti, trasformando la grande balena in una cometa divoratrice di mondi. Nell'anno 2099, l'astronauta fuggiasco Ismaele Jones sale a bordo del Cetus 7, e affida il proprio destino nelle mani di un folle capitano che caccia alla cieca la coda del mostro celeste. E nel vuoto impietoso, una ciurma di viaggiatori terrestri e alieni dovrà fronteggiare un giudizio divino e un 'nemico' che dispone della più spaventosa delle armi: il Tempo...

Mars was a distant shore, and the men spread upon it in waves. Each wave different, and each wave stronger.

Ray Bradbury is a storyteller without peer, a poet of the possible, and, indisputably, one of America?s most beloved authors. The Mars he imagines in these masterful chronicles is a place of hope, dreams, and metaphor?of crystal pillars and fossil seas?where a fine dust settles on the great, empty cities of a silently destroyed civilization. Bradbury?s The Martian Chronicles is a classic work of twentieth-century literature whose extraordinary power and imagination remain undimmed by time?s passage. In connected, chronological stories, a true grand master once again enthralls, delights, and challenges us with his vision and heart?starkly exposing in brilliant spacelight our strength, weakness, folly, and poignant humanity in a strange and breathtaking world where humanity does not belong.

You could hear the voices murmuring, small and muted, from the crowds that inhabited his body.

A peerless American storyteller, Ray Bradbury brings wonders alive. The Illustrated Man is classic Bradbury? eighteen startling visions of humankind?s destiny, unfolding across a canvas of decorated skin. In this phantasmagoric sideshow, living cities take their vengeance, technology awakens the most primal natural instincts, Martian invasions are foiled by the good life and the glad hand, and dreams are carried aloft in junkyard rockets. Provocative and powerful, Ray Bradbury?s The Illustrated Man is a kaleidoscopic blending of magic, imagination, and truth?as exhilarating as interplanetary travel, as maddening as a walk in a million-year rain, and as comforting as simple, familiar rituals on the last night of the world.

Ray Bradbury?s novel Fahrenheit 451 is an enduring masterwork of twentieth-century American literature?a chilling vision of a dystopian future built on the foundations of ignorance, censorship, and brutal repression. The origins and evolution of Bradbury?s darkly magnificent tale are explored in A Pleasure to Burn, a collection of sixteen selected shorter works that prefigure the grand master?s landmark novel. Classic, thematically interrelated stories alongside many crucial lesser-known ones?including, at the collection?s heart, the novellas ?Long After Midnight? and ?The Fireman??A Pleasure to Burn is an indispensable companion to the most powerful work of America?s preeminent storyteller, a wondrous confirmation of the inimitable Bradbury?s brilliance, magic . . . and fire.

Eight boys on their way to meet a friend one Halloween instead find themselves whisked away on a journey that shows them about the origins of Halloween as they continue to search for their missing friend. Book available.