It’s a Good Life by Jerome Bixby

“It’s a Good Life” is a 1953 science fiction short story by Jerome Bixby. It is about a small boy who uses his special powers to terrorize the small town in which he lives.

Non-Spoiler Summary In A Nutshell:

Anthony is a three year old boy who lives with his parents and Aunt Amy. No one ever comes to visit their house except when they have to. Why? Because Anthony has a terrible power – everything he wishes for comes true! He can read the minds of animals and humans alike, and although he often tries to be helpful his actions usually end up causing more harm than good. So while most people in rural Peaksville, Ohio stay away from Anthony’s house, they are sometimes forced to come and watch the town’s only tv on “television night” – special occasions when Anthony makes it create disturbing images. It is on one such night that the adults of Peaksville gather at Anthony’s home to celebrate the birthday of Dan Hollis that things get a little bit out of control – and disastrous consequences soon follow!

Bill Soames hurried past Anthony and reached the front steps, mumbling. He always mumbled when he came to the Fremont house, or passed by it, or even thought of it. Everybody did. They thought about silly things, things that didn’t mean very much, like two-and-two-is-four-and-twice-is-eight and so on; they tried to jumble up their thoughts to keep them skipping back and forth, so Anthony couldn’t read their minds. The mumbling helped. Because if Anthony got anything strong out of your thoughts, he might take a notion to do something about it–like curing your wife’s sick headaches or your kid’s mumps, or getting your old milk cow back on schedule, or fixing the privy. And while Anthony mightn’t actually mean any harm, he couldn’t be expected to have much notion of what was the right thing to do in such cases.

That was if he liked you. He might try to help you, in his way. And that could be pretty horrible.

If he didn’t like you … well, that could be worse.

My Two Cents:

• The good:

• The tone of “It’s a Good Life” is great! There is a very creepy feeling throughout the entire thing and that really enhances it!
• Personally I liked how the story dwelt very little on Anthony, and mostly on the people who interact with him. It adds to Anthony’s mystique.

• The bad:

• “It’s a Good Life” leaves out some details that you would really expect to be included, like telling you that Anthony changed a man “into something like nothing anyone would have believed possible” – which leaves it up to you to imagine what that “something” was. This can be a nice technique if your imagination is good, or rather blah if it isn’t.
• There are a few instances of profane language to watch out for.

Fact Sheet:
• Page Count: 15
• Word Count: 7,015
• “It’s a Good Life” garnered the following awards:

• It was listed at #12 in the 1999 Locus All-Time Poll for best short story.
• It placed 20th in the 1971 Astounding / Analog All-Time Poll for best short fiction.
• “It’s a Good Life” was nominated for a Retro Hugo award (in 2004) for best short story of 1953.

Where you can find “It’s a Good Life”:

• This short story first appeared in the 1953 short story collection entitled Star Science Fiction Stories No. 2.
• “It’s a Good Life” is included in Robert Silverberg’s amazing anthology The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume I.
• You can find a free HTML version of this story online at nickelkid.net.

Some Interesting Links:

• It was listed at #51 in the Top 100 Sci-Fi Short Stories at austarnet.com. (Retrieved Oct. 19,2008)
• Did you know that Jerome Bixby wrote a Star Trek episode entitled “Mirror, Mirror?” Yep. You can learn more about this science fiction author at Wikipedia.
• Did you see that creepy 1983 Twilight Zone movie? Well, “It’s a Good Life” was the basis for the third segment – you know, the one where the boy wishes his sister’s mouth away! Yikes – I had nightmares about that for years!

Craving More Stories?
If you enjoyed this story then you might also like Relay, about a man who claims to have traveled to the future while on a relay station in orbit above the Earth, by Lewis Shiner.

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