This is the novelization of the script Bradbury wrote for an animated version of the story for Chuck Jones which was never produced (an animated version of the story was produced in the 1990s). A group of young friends meet to go trick-or-treating but Pip, one of the gang has taken ill and is unable to participate. Pip tells his friends to go on without him and directs them to the "Halloween Tree" which is behind the obligatory creepy old house. There they meet the mysterious Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud who takes the boys on an excursion to Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, the Celtic Druids, Medieval France and the Notre Dame, Dio de Los Muertos in Mexico, and the Catacombs. It is at the catacombs where the friends must negotiate with Mr. Moundshroud for the life of Pip. Bradbury's storytelling and his lush descriptions make this a delightful, if dark story. My only quibble is Bradbury's historically inaccurate depiction of the Celtic festival of Samhain as being named for the God Samhain.
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