The Halloween Tree

"Anyone could see that the wind was a special wind this night, and the darkness took on a special feel because it was All Hallows' Eve. Everything seemed cut from soft black velvet or gold or orange velvet. Smoke panted up out of a thousand chimneys like the plumes of funeral parades. From kitchen windows drifted two pumpkin smells: gourds being cut, pies being baked." -- The Halloween Tree, p. 4

Why do we dress up on Halloween? How did the tradition of trick-or-treating begin? Why are witches, skeletons and ghosts associated with Halloween? The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury takes the reader on an incredible journey through the history of Halloween.

It's Halloween night, and for 13-year-old Tom Skelton and his friends, it's the most exciting evening of the year. But when they meet up to go trick-or-treating together, they realize that one of their friends is missing - Joe Pipkin, "the greatest boy who ever lived." When they arrive at Pipkin's house, Pip emerges, his face deathly pale. He says that he's not feeling well but he'll catch up with his friends at a house at the edge of town.

The boys arrive at the house to find an incredible sight: a giant tree filled with jack-o-lanterns, the Halloween Tree. There they meet the mysterious Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud, the sinister yet genial owner of the home. When he questions the boys about the significance of their costumes, the boys, dressed as a Skeleton, Mummy, Witch, Ghost, Gargoyle, etc. all realize that they don't know the stories behind their Halloween costumes. Mr. Moundshroud offers to help them discover the history of All Hallows' Eve, but the boys know they have to wait for Pip. When Pip appears, his friends call to him, but as Pip approaches, he stumbles and vanishes into the darkness. Mr. Moundshroud then takes the boys on an amazing journey through time and space, not only to learn the history of Halloween, but also to save their dear friend, Pipkin.

Mr. Moundshroud takes them to ancient Egypt, England during the time of the Druids, Notre Dame in the Middle Ages, and finally to the cemeteries of Mexico for the Day of the Dead. At each magical stop, they learn something new about how the traditions of Halloween were shaped by different cultures across the centuries, culminating in the holiday we know today.

Bradbury spins an imaginative and haunting tale of friendship and discovery in this remarkable book. While The Halloween Tree was first published in 1972, my first exposure to the story came from the excellent

Every Halloween Tom Skelton and 7 other boys would go trick-or-treating with Joe Pipkin. All of them are in their costumes playing in town when they realize that only 8 of them are present. Though their faces were all hidden by masks they knew who wasn't there. They could just tell he was missing. Joe Pipkin, the greatest boy who ever lived, the boy who never ever sat still was not with them.

The boys go to Pipkin's house. When he comes out, he is not his usual perky self. He tells his friends to go on, that he will meet them at the place of the Haunts. At a spooky house situated there, they meet Mr. Moundshroud and find his Halloween tree. Pipkin appears in the distance much later, but is whisked away from them by a dark something. Mr. Moundshroud takes them backwards on a journey through time and space to save their friend, Pipkin, from certain death and to learn the history and meaning of Halloween.

Part of their journey takes them through ancient Egypt, where they learned how death was part of everyday life, where Halloween seemed to take place each day.

The Grecian Isles are visited. There black molasses was painted on the doorposts so visiting ghosts would stick to them and not be able to come indoors.

They saw the festival of Samhain in England, as well as other festivals in different parts of Europe. In each place visited, their friend, Pipkin, would appear. All the time afraid that they will never see him again, they chase after him each time.

They chase him on to the Notre Dame in Paris, France, then on to Mexico. I'm not going to tell you how the story ends - that just wouldn't be right. There is no way that I could adequately convey to you just how unique this Halloween story is.

The ending is good and it is a suitable book for children of all ages. If one is easily scared, there is a slight chance it could be frightening, but only a slight chance. Only in one's imagination could the events in this story ever take place.

Each place they stop, creepy Mr. Moundshroud shares with the boys the unique customs surrounding death. Since Mr. Moundshroud represents death, he would know about every custom surrounding death at anytime in history.

The Halloween Tree was written by Ray Bradbury, a master of fantasy and science fiction. First published in 1972, it is a classic tale to be enjoyed by young and old alike.

I was surprised that I had never in my life heard of this tale, especially since I am such an avid reader. Ray Bradbury's unique description of events and surroundings is refreshing and easy to read. Families would enjoy reading the 145 pages of The Halloween Tree together.

Feels a bit like Corpse Bride and Nightmare Before Christmas. The doorway between life and death visited on Halloween night. Showing boys the fleeting quality of life and the common thread of rituals like Halloween that has connected cultures and peoples throughout time. Mr Moundshroud is a wonderfully creepy and magical supernatural tour guide who takes the boys on a seemingly long night’s tour of Halloween and a glimpse of the last rites of people throughout time. Ray Bradbury’s whimsical quality brings this adventure to life. You feel like you are brought along. So put on your mask and take the plunge. It will be a quick read. Surely, you won’t lose a year’s time reading this exciting ephemeral short story.

The title should say enough. This book is Bradbury. The name Ray Bradbury, to me (and I’m certain many others) is synonymous with magical prose, unlimited imagination, nostalgia, a sense of wonder and awe, and an adolescent view of the world that never forgets how joyous the years of our childhood are, and how lucky each of us older readers is to have experienced our own magical years. Bradbury. A man who weaves stories as if each word was a special ingredient to a recipe that would not quite be the same if it were replaced with another. Bradbury. Who writes in some of the most unusual similes that I’ve ever read. Among his many gifts, this might be his biggest. Literally right this moment, I’m going to open my book. To page . . . 50: “Somewhere, a mummy dreamed, coughed in its sleep, unraveled a bandage, twitched its dusty tongue and turned over for another thousand year snooze.” Let’s go to page . . . 66. “Darkness moved down the Mediterranean shores. From the tombs, like mist, the dead spirits wavered in soot and black plumes along the streets to be caught in the dark tar that smeared the porch sills. The wind mourned, as if telling the anguish of the trapped dead.” Bradbury. The man can spin a sentence like no other. I’ll be frank. This book was always going to be five stars. I love Halloween, and Autumn, and Bradbury is the best author for this season. Unless I found it unbearably boring or bad, this was destined to be five stars. It’s not boring, it’s exciting, it’s smart, it’s nostalgic, it’s a story only Ray Bradbury could have written, and it’s a fantastic tale for this time of year. My one gripe is that a younger me didn’t first read this while in grade school.

I've long enjoyed the video adaptation every Halloween, so I thought that I would read the book. And I like it, though I don't think I will be rereading it often.

The stories purpose is to tell the reader some aspects of the long and convoluted history that forms our modern understanding of Halloween traditions. And it does a good job of that, having a group of 8 boys dressed up in classic Halloween monster costumes being wisked to different time periods to examine how the people of those time viewed Halloween and how they connect to the costumes.

Their guide on this Journey is a Mr. Moundshroud who is rather entertaining in his speech and manner, and much more pleasant then his movie counterpart, with the book not really telling his true nature until the end.

The driving force of the book, the reason the boys are doing this, is to find their friend Pipkin who has been taken by death. And this is one of the book's weaknesses. Though the boys are traveling through time, Moundshroud makes it understood early on that they can't save Pipkin until they reach their final destination, so from that narrative point the adventure is incidental with only the end goal having any importance.

The other weak point of this story is the boys themselves. It takes the entire book to learn all of their names and they have virtually no personality. The majority of the time they lack individual dialogue and are written as just chanting a word someone else says or "Yes, Yes."

So to sum up, a pretty good book to explain to young readers where Halloween comes from. But not for readers who are looking for real character driven stories where the journey is as important as the end goal. If that is what you are after I would actually recommend the movie.

This is the first Bradbury book I have read. The cover art is very cool, I think that is my favorite part of the book. I like the first couple of chapters where the boys are meeting up and getting ready for Halloween night, and I like the last two or three chapters at the end when they make their deal with the mysterious Moundshroud, and afterwards when they go home. The story feels like a mess to me though. Bradbury repeats a few words over again in a few sentences, I guess to show how kids think or something. Whatever, it just feels like it tries to be more than a story. Maybe thats how Bradbury writes, I don't know, but it feels like the story wants to be poetic. Thats the best I can come up with to describe it. Example being the repeating of words two or three times such as "on the horizon Pip's body floated away on the wind, gone gone gone." That is not actually in the book but thats what I am talking about. Then there are quite a few fragments and really short paragraphs and other things that make the story seem more like it is being poetic. It reminds me of stuff like 'Ode to a Greecian Urn' and what not, like its wants to be more epic than what it is. The action and descriptions are hard to follow sometimes. This is happening and thats happening and this is going on in the wind or in the shadows or what not, that I just don't know what to follow. The idea is great. I think it could have been a better story without all the fast paced this is what Halloween is and where it came from story that we get in this book. There are eight boys in the story but more or less only three really ever talk or get mentioned in detailed. There is just way to much going on. This book might be great for kids 10-13, granted I am much much older I thought this would be a really good story, given all the hype that goes along with the name Bradbury. I don't really ever like to mention to much of the story because I don't want to give to much away. Books are better when you don't know what is going to happen, so please forgive me if I have been to vague. Just sharing a few of my opinions.

After more thought and a negative reply to my review, I have decided to say what I really feel about this book. This story is Bradburys ideaology on death. He believes that from the caveman to modern man, the Egyptian to the Druids, Romans, and Christians that they have all been looking for safety from the dark and safety from mans biggest fear, death itself. From how the Egyptians dressed their dead into mummies and prepared their resting places, to Mexico and their Day of the dead fest, man is just looking for a way to ward off, deal with, and react to death and the possibility that there is nothing after life. Bradbury wrote in one of the chapters of the Halloween Tree that all the gods of the past and present are made by man to cope with the dark and death. Now that is not word for word how he put it but it is pretty close. If I did not know better I would say Bradbury does not believe in anything such as a higher power. Which is fine, that does not bother me. To each his/her own. But that is why this book is not better. It is not a story on Halloween, but the authors thoughts on death and how man has delt with it through the ages. However he does say in the book when Jack Skeleton ask Mr. Moundshroud "will we ever stop being afraid..." Moundshroud replies "when we join the rest of the stars in the sky, we will not be afraid no more". So there is something after death just not what the Egyptians or Druids, Romans, Christans believe. This book is no classic. However it was a good idea, when it was about kids on Halloween night, with a Halloween tree, the freaky Mr. Moundshroud, and Pip's ghost or spirit whatever. Not when it became Bradbury's history lesson on Halloween and his ideaology on death. There is one or two sentences, and a couple of paragraphs that are really good, but I think the book is a miss unless you are a 10-13 year old that does not know any better. Please note this is just my "hollow criticism".