A Graveyard for Lunatics
Well call me confused. When I saw the title (A Graveyard for Lunatics
“Once upon a time there were two cities within a city. One was light and one was dark. One moved restlessly all day while the other never stirred. One was warm and filled with ever-changing lights. One was cold and fixed in place by stones. And when the sun went down each afternoon on Maximus Films, the city of the living, it began to resemble Green Glades cemetery just across the way, which was the city of the dead.”
And then I read a bit more, and confusion arises as I realise, waitaminute, this isn’t a city of the dead, it’s a studio city, as in Los Angeles, as in Hollywood. Hmm ok…. not so sure now.
So….our unnamed narrator (really a fictionalised version of Ray himself) is a scriptwriter, hired to write his dream project, a horror movie, working with his friend and model maker Ron. But it’s not a straight up job. There’s a bit of a creepy enough element to the book, which opens on Halloween eve at midnight, with the narrator venturing into the depths of the Green Glades cemetery, after receiving an anonymous note. There he discovers a body who looks like the founder of Maximus Films, who has been dead for many years. Is it a body? Is it just a prop? And some other weird things happen that leads him right in the middle of a whirlwind of intrigue.
So it’s a kind of mystery, right? And that sort of counts (checking the RIP V Challenge page…. and yes it does!).
Ok, while I love the previous works by Bradbury that I’ve read, I wasn’t too fond of this one. It’s is a very different book from anything else of his. The mystery part of it was fine enough, but I’m not all that familiar with Hollywood of the 1950s, which this book is a love song to.
It was only after I finished the book that I realised it was part two of a series! It was preceded by the novel Death Is a Lonely Business, and followed by Let’s All Kill Constance. Would reading the first book have made a difference to my opinion of Graveyard for Lunatics? I’m not all that sure.
This is my fourth read for the RIP V Challenge.
Wow, this one does sound really different from his other stuff. Not sure it’d be my taste, but I’d give anything by Bradbury a go.
Yeah it really is completely different! It was quite a surprise, although, sadly, not a very good surprise…
hmmm never heard of this but I love stories of old hollywood I may have to check this (and the other two ) out..
I see on your side bar you are reading “what dreams may come”..when you are done you might want to rent the movie with Robin Williams. It is definately a dark movie but it was very good.
I think I watched the movie version of What Dreams May Come many years ago (it’s quite an old movie right?), but I will have to check it out again. Thanks for the suggestion!
This is a strange book from Bradbury. The title is a bit misgiving!
It is, isn’t it. But in the end, it does kind of make sense…