I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Matheson brings the vampire tale into the age of science and reason. The protagonist, Robert Neville, considers the science of why the vampires are in some ways like the legends (e.g. Bram Stoker’s) Actually, Bram Stoker may be said have done so with a much more rudimentary state of science, but Matheson dispenses with the supernatural altogether.

Of course, where the book really shines is in Neville’s realization at the end, which I will not go into to avoid spoilers, but which makes the title quite apropos. (As opposed to the movie.)

For those having seen the Will Smith movie of the same name and wondering if the book will offer them some thing new, it certainly does. As alluded to above, the ending is entirely different, and the story-line bares little resemblance besides the existence of vampire-esque creatures.

I didn’t get why the vampires were so helpless to get into his house night after night (the old wives’ tale about having to invite them in is unmentioned), or at least I wondered about it throughout most of the book. I guess one can reason it out near the end. Some of Matheson’s descriptions reads like descriptions but turn out to be metaphor, and that can be a little confusing. (i.e. something like, “he felt a spike pierce his chest”, and you later realize he was just saying that it hurt sharply and intensely that there was no actual piercing and no literal spike.

View all my reviews