The Incredible Shrinking Man (LIBRARY EDITION) download epub

Imagine, if you will, both the physical and psychological toll of realizing that you're shrinking one-sevenths of an inch every day, that your height will continue to lessen until you're nothing—wiped from existence. While you were originally of average adult height, in time you become shorter than your wife who now finds it difficult to touch you intimately, shorter than your daughter who handles you like one of her dolls, smaller than the family cat that now stalks you from the safety of a miniature dollhouse that has become your new home, and finally...smaller than the predatory black widow spider bent on making a quick meal out of you.

Richard Matheson's "The Incredible Shrinking Man" is an engrossing novella of the sci-fi/horror persuasion, and although published in the 1950s it still holds up well today. The story alternates between protagonist Scott Carey's deteriorating home life due to his unprecedented shrinkage—not that sort of shrinkage!—and his present-day peril, marooned in the cellar and struggling to survive, the size of an ant. Matheson's storytelling expertise is on full display, and readers are given a front-row seat to the physical dangers and inherent difficulties of being less than an inch tall. Suspense aside, the novella is far more interesting from the emotional standpoint of the main character. Scott Carey views his loss of stature as both humiliating and ultimately dehumanizing. While some readers might lose patience with the Carey's sullen and hurtful disposition, as he wallows in self-pity over his misfortune and lashes out at everyone around him; on the other hand, those electing to stick with the story will be rewarded with a denouement that is both bleak and surprisingly hopeful.

Although Matheson's writing is overloaded with superfluous adverbs (a common practice during the 1950's era), strong premise prevails in this tale that tests the boundaries of your imagination without resorting to cheap gimmicks. Captivating in its simplicity, the story posits an interesting "What-if?" and then the rest becomes logical and terrifyingly plausible.

As an added bonus, this edition is packaged with nine classic short stories penned by Matheson, including "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet," which later became a popular Twilight Zone episode starring William Shatner as a not-so-frequent flyer haunted by the sight of a monster lurking on the wing of passenger jet, mid-flight; "Duel" wherein a traveling salesman becomes involved in pulse-pounding game of cat-and-mouse with a deranged truck driver; and "Mantage", in which a burgeoning writer wishes that life could be experienced much in the same way as in a movie—all the tedium glossed over, just the highlights, please—then the rest of his life elapses in 85 minutes. Amongst this reviewer's personal favorites was "The Distributor" and "The Test", both of which you won't soon forget.

These remarkable stories are literary masterpieces by a wonderfully expressive author. Matheson is masterful at telling a story that is at once fantastic to imagine and domestic to our daily comings and goings, evoking emotion at every turn, albeit mostly dark emotions.

When I was perhaps six or seven years old, I saw the movie based on this book and have remembered it ever since. It is a thrilling story of a man's incurable problem of shrinking about a half inch per day, eventually becoming microscopic. Along the way he must adapt to a myriad of things simply to survive, but eventually he is imperiled by what would have been mundane, but now tower over him with a deadly purpose. His survival skills are remarkable as well as cunning.

The climax occurs when his small size renders him smaller than the black widow spider who attacks him, and his only defense is a common sewing pin, now spear sized to him.

I whole heartedly recommend this book to any sic-fi fan. You won't be sorry.

Scott tells us his extraordinary tale. The aftermath of an improbable series of events caused him to catch a queer disease. To our dismay, the seemingly only one symptom of the disease is that he is decreasing in size, at a pace of 1 inch a day. From that point on his life is spiraling down. He loses his job, his marriage slowly drifts off and must eventually break apart from his daughter.

Back in the days, when I was a youngster, I used to fantasize about having shrunk to the size of a fly and go around unnoticed, discovering a whole new world. Had I read this book back then I would never have had these adventureful thoughts about littleness. The impregnated atmosphere in this novel is entirely different; its sad, gloomy, despairing and daunting.

The story switches back and forth in between the day he discovers his illness and the last few days of his existence, when he is about 1 inch in size. The life at that size is all about survival, how to find food and water while not being caught by giant spiders. We are very far from the juvenile idea I had about being his size.

Reducing in size is as slowly dying, Scott's body becomes smaller everydays like his ego, self-esteem and virility. He can't embrace his wife, her daughter has become dangerous to himself, even the cat is now a serious threat to his life. He becomes emasculated and feels less and less of a man, which drives him crazy and makes him grow to an obnoxious, irritable and frustrated being.

While being a depressing story, it is very interesting and gripping. It's about death, life and its meaning.

Imagine the physical and psychological impact of realizing that you are now losing 1/7 of an inch of height every day – and knowing that you will continue to lose 1/7” a day until you until the day you “zero-out”. You are originally 6’ 2”; but eventually become shorter than your wife, then shorter than your daughter, than smaller than the family cat, then …

The book starts with the main character (Scott Carey) only the size of a spider, so it’s through a series of flashbacks that we see Scott’s increasing fears and frustrations as he becomes more and more physically diminutive -- and feels less and less a husband & father & man. Of course, such a story line is quite depressing; and so the book was a depressing read, too.

Like Richard Matheson’s “I Am Legend”, this book is very much focused on the main character; and consequently, the book contains quite a bit of philosophizing (which was okay with me). I did feel, though, that the book spent too much time describing his attempts to climb the now gargantuan-sized chairs, tables, etc.