I Sing the Body Electric! And Other Stories

Love the story of the young men on a ferry coming to a small town in Ireland!

Mandatory sci-fi reading.

This was kind of a mixed bag for me. I loved some of the stories, but others were just kinda blegh...not unexpected, when dealing with an anthology, I suppose. Let's do this by story then.... -The Kilimanjaro Device: I didn't get this one, so I read it again. I still don't get it. -The Terrible Conflagration Up At The Place: At least I understand the plot of this one, but I...more

This was kind of a mixed bag for me. I loved some of the stories, but others were just kinda blegh...not unexpected, when dealing with an anthology, I suppose. Let's do this by story then.... -The Kilimanjaro Device: I didn't get this one, so I read it again. I still don't get it. -The Terrible Conflagration Up At The Place: At least I understand the plot of this one, but I miss the point. -Tomorrow's Child: Not a bad Sci-Fi story. -The Women: Chilling, if a bit odd. -The Inspired Chicken Motel: Odd. Not bad, but odd. -Downwind From Gettysburg: Odd. I'm not sure I got the point. -Yes, We'll Gather At The River: A poignant critique of the idea of progress and those left behind. -The Cold Wind And The Warm: A bit odd, but heartwarming. -Night Call, Collect: This is one of my favorite stories in the book, as a stranded colonist on Mars fights for his sanity. -The Haunting Of The New: A poignant morality tale. -I Sing The Body Electric!: Think Mary Poppins with a robot. -The Tombling Day: A treatise on life, death, and growing old. -Any Friend Of Nicholas Nickleby's Is A Friend Of Mine: A story about fantasy, dreams, and the power of belief. -Heavy-Set: Creepy. -The Man In The Rorschach Shirt: A rather humorous tale about a Psychologist who finds that his entire practice has been a sham, no matter his success. -Henry The Ninth: A pessimistic view of the future in which humanity has abandoned most of the earth in favor of moving to the tropics. This is the tale of the last man alive in Great Britain. -The Lost City Of Mars: A chilling tale of a city that fulfills your every dream. -Christus Apollo: A Christmas hymn for the stars.   hide

Some great thought experiments, fascinating plotlines that would make for interesting Metro conversations, but Bradbury's style itself (any time he wanders away from the nuts and bolts of the straight-up narrative), is so self-consciously stylized that it's onerous to read. And his dialogue tends to the ludicrously unspontaneous (even for robot grandmothers).