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We’ll Always Have Paris review
By Lindsey | February 4, 2009
Ray Bradbury
We’ll Always Have Paris
HarperCollins
224 pages
$29.95
Ray Bradbury’s newest collection, We’ll Always Have Paris, is full of stories about the eerie, strange, and creepy, but also showcases Bradbury’s talent for writing about feelings of nostalgia. We’ll Always Have Paris features 21 short stories and one poem, all previously unpublished.
In the book’s introduction, Bradbury lists “Massinello Pietro” as his favourite in this collection because it actually happened to him many years ago: “Pietro became a friend of mine who I tried to protect from the police and help when he was brought into court. The short story that was inspired by this friendship is, in many ways, basically true.”
“Massinello Pietro” begins the collection and shows Bradbury tackling the persona of the watcher, the observer. Bradbury splits his time observing and also giving the reader the strange and creepy sci-fi tales he’s most renowned for (like in “The Reincarnate”). Creepy and dark stories like “Murder” and “When The Bough Breaks” especially demonstrate Bradbury’s gift of writing speculative fiction. We’ll Always Have Paris brings to life heart transplant patients and their organ donors, radio personalities, and babies who were never born.
Bradbury explains that he writes in explosions or impulses, never over-thinking his stories—something he recommends the reader to also participate in. He explains further: “The stories, one by one, came to me throughout my life—from a very young age through my middle and later years. Every one of them has been a passion. Every story here was written because I had to write it. Writing stories is like breathing for me. I watch: I get an idea, fall in love with it, and try not to think too much about it. I then write: I let the story pour fourth onto the paper as soon as possible.”
The only downside to We’ll Always Have Paris is the poem, “America,” which seems out of place, almost as if it were tacked on as an afterthought. It is thought-provoking, just not necessary to this collection.
It’s easy to get wrapped up in Bradbury’s very short stories, wanting nothing more than to just simply sit back and enjoy them. He has a different way of thinking and looking at things, and translating that to the written word.
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