Having ran out of new reading material after finishing the three James Bond books my wifey got me for my birthday, after getting the hint in the recent post I wrote, I was desperate for new reading material. But that truly is never a problem for me; I just have to browse through my library. In doing so, the first book I grabbed was by one of my all-time favorite authors, Steven King.

STEPHEN KING

This book, however, wasn’t one of his usual horror works. It was a non-fictional book, Danse Macabre, which he wrote in 1979 covering the story of horror fiction in print, radio, film and comics up to that time, which was early in what has come to be his prolific career as a purveyor of that written genre. And having began his working career as a teacher, he presents this history in a very professional way, almost as a professor yet, at times, in an entertaining humorous, satirical and even sarcastic way that totally captured my attention the first time I read it over thirty years ago.

But in beginning to read this book again, I only got a few pages into what he titled Chapter One, October 4, 1957, and an Invitation to Dance, the date being when the Russians launched Sputnik I, which to King, at that time, was the real terror as opposed to all the monster and alien movies he was accustomed to viewing. But what I ran into just a few pages into the book was the reference to the classic 1956 sci-fi movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

JACK FINNEY

Of course I’ve seen that movie many-a-time over the years, as well as the 1978 remake. But running into that reference sidetracked me from continuing my trek through Danse Macabre and sent me back to the bookcase in search of my well-worn copy of Jack Finney’s novel Invasion of the Body Snatchers, originally published as The Body Snatchers in 1955. Though well-known as the author of this work and the novel Assault on a Queen, Finney is most known for his two novels about time travel, Time and Again and From Time to Time, as well as his short story collections about time travel, The Third Level and About Time.

So I’ve spent the past few days of reading refreshing my memory with Invasion of the Body Snatchers and then About Time. And one of the most interesting stories I read in About Time was “I Love Galesburg in the Springtime.” It put me in mind of many thoughts I’ve had as of late about the changing of times and the changing of the area in which I grew up. I’ve found myself looking around and seeing so many of the things I remember as a kid and young adult disappearing right before my eyes. Sure, that’s progress, but…at what expense? Of course, all in the good ol’ days wasn’t necessarily all that good. Still, nostalgia is something that will never disappear, regardless of progress, and such memories are priceless.