Scan barcode
A review by jeremyhornik
The Best of Richard Matheson by Richard Matheson
5.0
There is a sick perfection in the eerie short stories of Richard Matheson, and this is the best collection I’ve read. Whether they have a twist ending, or just proceed grimly to their fated climax, there is a mid century cleanliness to them like an Eames chair or a Dexter Gordon solo. Each element in the story is placed just so, in relation to the others. There is a rhythm that carries the reader along without the need to consciously follow the story... it tells itself to you. There is a simplicity of phrase that belies the precision of the imagery: less words draw cleaner pictures.
The stories are weird and sick, the characters smug or desperate, the relationships unwieldy, the violence often inevitable. Horror is the core of these stories, whether they are crime stories, sci fi, monsters, or even romances. It’s a cold horror, one that looks calmly at things and says that this thing is both wrong and inevitable (and if you think that’s easy to do, try it.)
Oddly delightful.
The stories are weird and sick, the characters smug or desperate, the relationships unwieldy, the violence often inevitable. Horror is the core of these stories, whether they are crime stories, sci fi, monsters, or even romances. It’s a cold horror, one that looks calmly at things and says that this thing is both wrong and inevitable (and if you think that’s easy to do, try it.)
Oddly delightful.