The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl

1948 short story by Ray Bradbury

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"The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl"

Short story by Ray Bradbury
Country| United States
Language| English
Genre(s)| Crime, Short story
Publication
Published in| Detective Book Magazine
Publication type| magazine
Media type| Print
Publication date| November 1948

"The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" is a short story by Ray Bradbury. It was first published in Detective Book Magazine in November 1948 (cover date: Winter) as "Touch and Go".[1] The story was re-titled and published as "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" in EQMM in January 1953.[2]

## Plot summary

[edit]

Mr. Acton begins the story standing over the body of Mr. Huxley, whom he has just killed. While attempting to cover up his tracks, he has flashbacks of his encounters with Mr. Huxley, with whom he is having an altercation over a woman. These flashbacks reveal to the murderer that there are more and more of his fingerprints all over the man's house, because he thought that he had touched so many different objects. His frenzy to remove all of the evidence distracts him from his actual objective, to get away with the crime. He is eventually caught, after polishing the entire house, while polishing and re-polishing the glass fruit at the bottom of a bowl. He is discovered by the police while dusting the attic. He leaves the room polishing the door handle and slamming it in victory.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Content Cillian K and Nicholas L. "Index to Science Fiction Anthologies and Collections, Combined Edition". Retrieved 2007-03-26.
2. ^ "Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine January 1953 cover photo". Archived from the original (jpg) on September 16, 2024. Retrieved October 24, 2024.

## Publication history

[edit]

The story was included in several of Bradbury's short story collections:

* The Golden Apples of the Sun, 1953
* The Vintage Bradbury, 1965
* Twice 22, 1966
* A Song Of Thunder and Other Stories, 2005

## Adaptations in other media

[edit]

This story was adapted to the EC comic book Crime SuspenStories #17 (April–May 1953) as "Touch and Go" by Johnny Craig. ("comics.org". Retrieved 18 February 2013.) It was adapted as an episode of the television series The Ray Bradbury Theater (January 23, 1988) as "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" with Michael Ironside and Robert Vaughn. An additional character called bob the spider and pop-up-duck was written down for the comic but never actually used in this short story. It is believed that the creator also thought of bizarre characters such as stambam or nickle bickle. Mr stups was invented for mistake, horror and murder scenes in the comic but never actually published.

## External links

[edit]

* The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

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Ray Bradbury

Bibliography (Short fiction)

Novels|

* The Martian Chronicles (1950)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1953)
* Dandelion Wine (1957)
* Something Wicked This Way Comes (1962)
* The Halloween Tree (1972)
* Death Is a Lonely Business (1985)
* A Graveyard for Lunatics (1990)
* Green Shadows, White Whale (1992)
* From the Dust Returned (2001)
* Let's All Kill Constance (2002)
* Farewell Summer (2006)

Short stories|

* "Hollerbochen's Dilemma" (1938)
* "The Scythe" (1943)
* "I, Rocket" (1944)
* "The Lake" (1944)
* "Frost and Fire" (1946)
* "The Million Year Picnic" (1946)
* "The Small Assassin" (1946)
* "I See You Never" (1947)
* "Fever Dream" (1948)
* "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" (1948)
* "The Long Years" (1948)
* "Mars Is Heaven!" (1948)
* "Dark They Were, and Golden-Eyed" (1949)
* "The Exiles" (1949)
* "Marionettes, Inc." (1949)
* "The Long Rain" (1950)
* "The Rocket" (1950)
* "There Will Come Soft Rains" (1950)
* "The Veldt" (1950)
* "Ylla" (1950)
* "Embroidery" (1951)
* "The Fog Horn" (1951)
* "Here There Be Tygers" (1951)
* "The Pedestrian" (1951)
* "The April Witch" (1952)
* "A Sound of Thunder" (1952)
* "The Wilderness" (1952)
* "The Flying Machine" (1953)
* "The Golden Kite, the Silver Wind" (1953)
* "The Meadow" (1953)
* "The Murderer" (1953)
* "Sun and Shadow" (1953)
* "All Summer in a Day" (1954)
* "The Dragon" (1955)
* "The Aqueduct" (1979)
* "Banshee" (1984)
* "The Toynbee Convector" (1984)
* "Is That You, Herb?" (2003)

Collections|

* Dark Carnival (1947)
* The Illustrated Man (1951)
* The Golden Apples of the Sun (1953)
* The October Country (1955)
* A Medicine for Melancholy (1959)
* The Day It Rained Forever (1959)
* The Small Assassin (1962)
* R Is for Rocket (1962)
* The Machineries of Joy (1964)
* The Vintage Bradbury (1965)
* S Is for Space (1966)
* Twice 22 (1966)
* I Sing the Body Electric! (1969)
* Ray Bradbury (1975)
* Long After Midnight (1976)
* The Fog Horn & Other Stories (1979)
* The Last Circus and the Electrocution (1980)
* The Stories of Ray Bradbury (1980)
* The Fog Horn and Other Stories (1980)
* Dinosaur Tales (1983)
* A Memory of Murder (1984)
* The Toynbee Convector (1988)
* Classic Stories 1 (1990)
* Classic Stories 2 (1990)
* The Parrot Who Met Papa (1991)
* Selected from Dark They Were, and Golden-Eyed (1991)
* Quicker Than the Eye (1996)
* Driving Blind (1997)
* Ray Bradbury Collected Short Stories (2001)
* One More for the Road (2002)
* Bradbury Stories: 100 of His Most Celebrated Tales (2003)
* The Cat's Pajamas: Stories (2004)
* A Sound of Thunder and Other Stories (2005)
* The Dragon Who Ate His Tail (2007)
* Summer Morning, Summer Night (2007)
* A Pleasure to Burn (2010)
* The Collected Stories of Ray Bradbury (2011, 2014)

Plays|

* The Meadow (1947)
* The Flying Machine: A One-Act Play for Three Men (1953)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit and Other Plays (1972)
* Pillar of Fire and Other Plays (1975)
* The Martian Chronicles (1986)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1986)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1986)
* Dandelion Wine (1988)
* The Veldt (1988)

Adaptations|

* It Came from Outer Space (1953)
* Moby Dick (1956 screenplay)
* "I Sing the Body Electric" (1962)
* The Autumn People (1965)
* Tomorrow Midnight (1966)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1966)
* The Picasso Summer (1969)
* The Illustrated Man (1969)
* The Martian Chronicles (1980 miniseries)
* The Electric Grandmother (1982)
* Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983)
* Bradbury 13 (radio series, 1983–84)
* Fahrenheit 451 (1984)
* "The Burning Man" (1985)
* The Veldt (1987)
* The Ray Bradbury Theater (TV series, 1985–86, 1988-1992)
* The Halloween Tree (1993)
* Dandelion Wine (1997)
* The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1998)
* A Sound of Thunder (2005)
* Ray Bradbury's Chrysalis (2008)
* The Whispers (2015)
* Fahrenheit 451 (2018)

Miscellaneous|

* Futuria Fantasia (1939–1940)
* The Mummies of Guanajuato (1978)
* Zen in the Art of Writing (1990)
* It Came from Outer Space (2003 book)

Characters|

* Guy Montag

Related|

* Bettina F. Bradbury (daughter)
* Spaceship Earth
* Ray Bradbury Center
* Bradbury Landing
* Ray Bradbury Award
* Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury
* Dandelion crater

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