Something Wicked This Way Comes ~ Ray Bradbury

Will Halloway and Jim Nightshade are more like brothers than best friends, born just one day apart they live next door to each other in a small American town.  The novels opens with the promise of fun that only a child can see as Autumn begins, but a dark cloud is about to hover over them as an ancient carnival pulls into town.  The boys realise that something is very wrong with the carnival when they see one of its operators Mr Cooger ride the carousel backwards and so watch him grow younger and younger until he is a small boy.

Mr Dark, the illustrated man, seduces adults with promises of youth and his body is covered with the images of those he has lured.  What the adults don't realise is that to be young again will mean giving up all their friends, and finding themselves alone so frightens them when they have become a child that they beg to go back on the carousel.  They are promised that they will be given back their lives but first they must travel as freaks within the carnival.

One such freak is the blind Dustwitch - one night Mr Dark sends her out in a monstrous balloon to find the boys.  The sound of the balloon billowing in the wind and the blind freak holding out her hands to sense the boys is very creepy. They know the secret of the carnival and Mr Dark needs to silence them.......................  make no mistake, this is not a childrens book.  It is brilliantly told from a child's perspective, and I love how Will's opinion of his father grows.  He initially sees him as an old janitor at the library, but as the novel progresses Will realises that he seems taller and stronger - dependable and more importantly, he believes.