"There Will Come Soft Rains"
Plot Summary
"There Will Come Soft Rains" is a short story by science fiction author Ray Bradbury which was first published in the May 6, 1950. It is an erie short story. The kind that gives the reader chills afterwards. It was written based on the increased threat of nuclear weapons. It takes place in a house, a luxury house. This house does everything the owner could want. The house maintains itself and takes out trash. Anything you can think of the house does. The weird part is that the house has no owner. The reader is unaware why but the story is told through an image imprinted on a wall. Later the reader finds out that this family as well as every other family were killed as a result of nuclear weapons. The house is later destroyed by a fallen tree. The only thing that remains is the wall than shows the past owners playing outside.
Themes
This short story brings the effects of nuclear weapons into a new light. It shows a world after humans kill each other due to nuclear war. The main cause of this short story was the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. This story demonstrates Sci-fi perfectly because it brings the fears of the public and puts them in a way that makes it real. It causes the audiences to think about nuclear weapons. At this time in history not a day went by that civilians were not afraid of an ordinary cloud changing to an atomic radiation cloud.