Thread for the discussion of The Bradbury Chronicles by Sam Weller -- or Ryder's review.

The article is here.

This would have been a better review if Ryder had not so often used the past tense in referring to Ray Bradbury who is very much alive and still writing.

The review summarizes much from Weller's book but, like The Bradbury Chronicles,(IMHO), though it often mentions Ray's "softer" side, (lyrical, poetic, pacifist, etc.), it doesn't dwell enough on the toughness, feistiness and sheer cussed independence of the man and his work. At least not enough for me, a long-time fan of Ray.

Weller wrote this book after Bradbury suffered his stroke. Wish there was a way-back machine that could've taken him to Ray when he was in his physical prime. Oh well...

Am hoping for a bolder biography of Ray, and a less perfunctory review of Weller's exhaustively researched, well-meaning but, to me, conceptually limited work.

I was bothered by the use of past tense, too. The whole time I was thinking that Bradbury had died and that somehow I had missed it. It sounds like he has had an interesting life, and the fact that Bradbury endorses the biography does make me more interested in it.