Ray Bradbury’s newest collection of short stories, WE’LL ALWAYS HAVE PARIS features new pieces; some written between 2005--2007 but the bulk were written in 2009. The ink is still drying. Bradbury, may the universe bless him, will be ninety this year and he is still writing.Although thought of as a science fiction writer, Bradbury’s work more closely resembles speculative fiction (a genre which speculates about worlds unlike our own, including utopian or dystopian fantasies) or social fiction (which is a more anthropological version of science fiction, as seen in the writing of Ursula K. LeGuin). In this newest collection, we get a bit of both genres, but more often than not, we are on earth, in ordinary reality, reading about people: just people, living their lives, while things happen to and around them. Some stories are sweet ("Arrival and Departure"), some are bittersweet ("The Visit"), some are creepy ("Ma Perkins Comes To Stay"), some are puzzling ("Remembrance, Ohio"), and some are metaphysically inspiring ("The Reincarnate").
It is a bit of a misnomer to call these short stories. They are more like sketches, brief pencil strokes scratching out the general shape of something so as not to be forgotten. It feels like these sketches should be material for later, more in-depth, more fully realized stories. They are fleeting, flitting. They feel light-weight; some are only two or three pages long! The ideas are good, the writing is typical, straight-forward Bradbury, but the presentation is often over before you know it.
The interesting thing to note about Bradbury’s recent writing is that it unexpectedly includes a lot of gay themes and plots. The title story is about an older, married gentleman on vacation in Paris with his wife. He goes out alone for a walk one evening after midnight and— well, there is really no other word for it—cruises a young man. They find themselves in a closed, darkened gym after hours. The young man unbuttons the gentleman’s shirt. The young man kisses the gentleman. But the situation is not right and they part. Other stories show great sympathy for gay characters and an acceptance without any judgment, a commendable feat for a nearly ninety year old man who was raised in a different era, where the general culture was not as understanding or accepting.
Recommend? Large type and lots of white space make this a very fast read. If you have nothing else queued up on your night stand, give it a try. Otherwise, you’ll be fine without it.
