Then you can start reading Kindle books on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required. As time progresses, Neville turns scientific and discovers some of the microbiological aspects of the plague, as well as how it spreads from host to host. Ben Cortman, colleague and neighbour who reminds him on Oliver Hardy (the comedian) shouts every evening he should come out. I loved this book! I'll say this; I'm glad I saw the movie before I read the book. He checked each window to see if any of the boards had been loosened. I realize this is one of the "classics" of science fiction (or science fantasy)and I don't care. I just finished reading this book. It was tiresome, monotonous work, and it filled the air with hotsmelling wood dust that settled in his pores and got into his lungs and made him cough. Four fifths of the way through and the only thing on my mind was how incredibly boring and one-dimensional Robert Neville is. You read how more and more got infected, how they were buried (this will give you nightmares). No matter how many stakes he made, they were gone in no time at all. The book plotline is so different from the movie, I didn't really have a hard time with it. In another hour they’d be at the house again, the filthy bastards. Neither movie was anything like this book And this book was bad. Eventually he’d have to lathe down rectangular lengths of wood. To get the free app, enter your mobile phone number. The vampire plague has claimed all human life. Above it, on the wall, were haphazard racks of the tools that Robert Neville used. It was a quarter to five. Robert Neville is the last uninfected man still alive. There was a pandemic (seems familiar in times like ours at the moment). That was why he chose to stay near the house on those days. When we meet him he's been living at his present place for 5 months. As soon as the light was gone. Robert Neville is the only human left in his neighbourhood and possibly in the world. “One of the most important writers of the twentieth century.” ―Ray Bradbury, “I think the author who influence me the most as a writer was Richard Matheson. Until he found something better, it was his first line of defense. This was a very cool book. He’d burned them down to prevent them from jumping on his roof from the adjacent ones. At some time a woman who calls herself Ruth, enters his dreadful life. Great plot, great prose, compelling and several movie adaptions! Let ’em fall, he thought. When it got too oppressive, he snapped on the air-conditioning unit and suction drew away the worst of it. He’d made himself a whisky and soda at his small bar and he held the cold glass as he read a physiology text. He looked up and down Cimarron Street, the cool breeze ruffling his blond hair. After viewing product detail pages, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in. Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read. He worked in silence, lips pressed into a hard line, a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, his eyes staring at the bit as it gnawed away the wood and sent floury dust filtering down to the floor. There are no gory descriptions of decapitation or mass battles, but the tension is real. Summary Analysis Neville wakes up in his house. I just re-read this after watching some of the movies based on it. By this time the water was boiling and he dropped in the frozen string beans and covered them, thinking that it was probably the electric stove that was milking the generator. As he flicked the wall switch, the light flickered, then flared into normal brilliance. The name already shows what he is to the human-like vampires (for the feral type he's just blood-source really). He passed slowly through the dim silence of the living room, turned left into the small hallway, and left again into his bedroom. But from a distance they’d thrown rocks until he’d been forced to cover the broken panes with plywood scraps. I turned the first page of "I Am Legend" with zero knowledge of what Hollywood did to it because a friend of mine gave me an important warning. It was also an inspiration behind Night of the … I'm not sure if reading about a global pandemic that wiped out most of the worlds population was really wise at the minute, but the fact that they turned into vampires was a welcomed twist?? I assumed he looked like Will Smith in my head till Matheson gave a description, and then the description seemed to make more sense with the book character's life and personality. Ben Cortman, colleague and neighbour who reminds him on Oliver Hardy (the comedian) shouts every evening he should come out. I Am Legend is a 1954 post-apocalyptic horror novel by American writer Richard Matheson that was influential in the modern development of zombie and vampire literature and in popularizing the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to disease. The book plotline is so different from the movie, I didn't really have a hard time with it. The book is as much a psychological study of the effects of extreme loneliness, loss and grief, as it is fighting off the undead. A new terror born in death, a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. Both the tank and the hothouse were undamaged today. Finally one day he’d torn off the plywood and nailed up even rows of planks instead. Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2018. It tells the tale of (seemingly) the last "human" alive on earth, Richard Neville, surrounded by zombie hordes. By day he goes about his business: repairing his fortified house, stringing garlic necklaces, sharpening stakes, collecting supplies from what he can scavenge in town.