by Ray Bradbury
First published 1986
In the foggy, melancholy streets of an unnamed city, a down-on-his-luck writer stumbles upon a dead body. Drawn into the mystery, he finds himself entangled in a web of isolation, obsession, and the ghosts of his own past. As he delves deeper, the line between reality and illusion blurs, and the writer must confront the darkest corners of the human condition. Bradbury's poetic, atmospheric tale explores loneliness, creativity, and the power of the written word to both reveal and conceal the truth.
Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, 20th-century, mystery, crime, adult-fiction, detective, dark
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, lyrical, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: blurred-reality, unreliable-narrator
Setting: California, Venice (Los Angeles, Calif.), Los Angeles
240 pages · Paperback · MorrowPb
Content warnings: death, mental-illness