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Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962) is a novel by Ray Bradbury. It is about two boys, named Jim Nightshade and William Halloway, who have an unpleasant experience with a nightmarish carnival that comes to their Midwestern town one October. The mysterious and sinister carnival is presided over by Mr. Dark, a man who bears a tattoo for every person who, enticed by the offer of living out one's secret fantasies, has become part of the show — many unwillingly. Countering Mr. Dark's malevolent presence is Will's father, who finds his own life force tempered by middle-age melancholy.

In tone and setting (the fictitious Green Town, Illinois), Something Wicked can be seen as an autumn sequel to the summer of Bradbury's Dandelion Wine, with the latter novel's Doug Spaulding and John Huff reincarnated one year older as Will and Jim. Bradbury has said that the character of Mr. Halloway was inspired by his own father. The character of Mr. Electrico was inspired by a more benign carnival magician of the same name, who commanded the twelve-year-old Bradbury to "Live forever!"

The novel originated in 1955 when Bradbury suggested to friend Gene Kelly that they collaborate on a movie for Kelly to direct. Bradbury offered his 1948 short story The Black Ferris as an 80-page outline treatment. When Kelly was unable to obtain financial backing for the movie, Bradbury expanded the treatment to novel length. The title comes from the witch's statement in Macbeth, "By the pricking of my thumbs / Something wicked this way comes."

The novel was made into the Disney movie Something Wicked This Way Comes in 1983, with a screenplay by Bradbury.

Plot

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The novel opens on an October 24th evening. Two fourteen-year old boys and friends, William Halloway and Jim Nightshade, encounter a strange lightning-rod salesman who claims that a storm is coming their way. Throughout that same night, Will and Jim meet up with townsfolk who also sense something in the air; the barber says that the air smells of cotton candy. Among the townspeople is Will's fifty-four year old father, Charles Halloway, the local librarian, who broods philosophically about his position in life, including on how he misses being young like his son.

Later on in the night, Will and Jim discover a flier advertising the coming of a "Cooger and Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show," a carnival with many wonders and delights. At exactly three o'clock on that evening, the boys hear an old train rolling past their homes, and they follow it to watch the carnival being assembled, although they are disquieted by the way the people set the tents up silently, in an almost ghost-like manner.

The next morning, Will and Jim head on down to the carnival. It appears to be an ordinary carnival -- until Mrs. Foley, their gradeschool teacher, gets lost and bewildered in a Mirror Maze, and claims that she saw a girl in there that looked just like her when she was young. The mystery surrounding the carnival deepens when, at sunset, the boys meet the flame-haired Cooger and Mr. Dark, an illustrated man covered in tattoos, in person next to an apparently broken-down carousel. When the boys hide in a tree to spy on them, they witness Cooger riding the carousel backwards, growing a year younger with each revolution, until he becomes a twelve-year-old child.

The boys learn that the twelve-year-old Cooger is posing as Mrs. Foley's nephew, trying to get her to ride the carousel. That night, Will begins to fear that Jim, realizing that if he rides the carousel forward, he can become older, will attempt to ally with Cooger. His suspicions prove true; Cooger invites Jim to ride the carousel with him, but Will manages to stop Jim in time. He also causes the carousel to spin madly forward, so that when it stops, Cooger becomes an extremely old and withered man.

Frightened, the boys tell the police what happened, but Dark at the carnival convinces them that Cooger's aging was an elaborate stunt, and the police drive the boys home. Will becomes frustrated when he realizes that Jim still hasn't completely renounced the carnival yet. When they get home, they learn that they have been accused by Mrs. Foley of stealing her jewelry, thanks to Cooger's scheming -- a plot by the carnival to ensure that nobody will listen to them if they attempt to warn anybody about its dangers.

The next day, Will and Jim decide to hide in the carnival so that its members will not follow them to their families. Charles Halloway, checking the carnival out, happens upon their hiding place and manages to prevent Dark and the Tarot Witch from finding them. After they leave, Charles tells the boys to meet him in the library where he works at, to discuss more about what to do with the carnival.

When they meet, Charles explains his views on the nature of the carnival, and how it preys on weak, sinful souls for energy. He says that the carnival was created by the "autumn people" to feed off on the greediness and unhappiness of people; they entice people to ride the carousel by exploiting their fear of death. When the newly young (and miserable) people realize that they want to return back to their normal age, the carnival employs them to their line of freaks, probably for eternity.

As they debate on what kind of weapons to use against the carnival, they suddenly hear someone enter the library. The boys hide, and Charles finds that the visitor is Dark. Dark first attempts to seduce Charles into helping him in exchange for becoming young again; when Charles refuses, Dark crushes his right hand, and locates the boys at the back of the library. The Tarot Witch comes in to "slow down" Charles' heart. She almost succeeds, but Charles suddenly laughs at the sight of her "tickling" him, and the Witch flees.

Charles chases after Dark who is leading the boys to the carnival. He volunteers to participate in a magic bullet catch act with the Witch, where he takes advantage of the freaks' fear of others' happiness by carving a smile on the bullet and shocking the Witch to death by firing it with Will standing by as his "good right hand."

As the carnival closes, Charles and Will run after Jim in the Mirror Maze. Charles almost gives way when he sees progressively older versions of himself in the mirrors, but when Will tells him that he doesn't care if he's old, he suddenly understands who he is, and professes his acceptance with a laugh, which shatters the Mirror Maze.

The carnival is in disarray now, thanks to them, but Jim is successfully lured into stepping on the carousel. Will tries to pull him from the carousel, but ends up knocking Jim unconscious. Meanwhile, Charles is led away by a boy who claims that Dark frightened him, until Charles realizes that the boy himself is Dark. He kills Dark by embracing him, knowing that he cannot endure love, and revives Jim by having himself and Will sing and dance away all misery, experiencing only pure joy. The novel ends with the two boys and Charles running away in the night together as comrades, Charles finally having found self-acceptance.

Characters

• William Halloway -- Born one minute after midnight on October 31, Will is described as having done "only six years of staring." Will is naturally obedient and wary to get involved in difficult situations; nonetheless, he takes on an active role in fighting the carnival's evil power.
• Jim Nightshade -- Born one minute before midnight on October 31, Jim is brooding and brash, acting as a foil for Will's cautiousness and practicability. Jim especially wants to become older, which makes him vulnerable to the carnival's temptations, but is ultimately saved through his friendship with Will.
• Charles Halloway -- A middle-aged man who starts out in the novel as a quietly unhappy man, but eventually gains self-awareness and confidence while up against the carnival, and becomes a fighter in his own right by the end of the book.
• Mr. Dark -- A sinister man who bears illustrations all over his body for each person seduced by the carnival into work with the freaks. Dark initially holds sway over the other main characters, but his power weakens when Charles uses happy emotions against him, something he cannot comprehend or withstand.
• Cooger -- Dark's partner in running the carnival. Cooger, in his guise as a twelve-year-old nephew, was able to persuade Mrs. Foley to come to the carnival. The tables are turned on him, however, when Will increases the speed of the carousel as he is riding it to such an extent that he becomes an ancient crone. He later crumbles into dust when the freaks try to escort him back to the carousel.
• Mrs. Foley -- A forty-year-old schoolteacher of Will and Jim. Much like the other victims of the carnival, Mrs. Foley wished to become young again. However, when she got her wish, she became a frightened little girl who was found by Will and Jim, crying under a tree. It is not stated in the novel what happened to Mrs. Foley at the end; the best theory is that she ran away with the freaks as the carnival collapsed.

References in popular culture

The title of the first Charmed episode "Something Wicca This Way Comes," is clearly inspired by the title of this book.

The South Park episode "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes" gets its title directly from the book and has a similar plot about a department store luring townsfolk with its super-low prices.

External links

• SparkNotes Study Guide

• Official Ray Bradbury Web site

• 1962 novels
• Fantasy novels
• Works of Ray Bradbury
• Fictional carnivals