Rating: 
Summary: Body versus mind
Review: The fairly plain life of Scott Carey, this book's title character, gets unusual when he starts to shrink by one-seventh of an inch per day after being exposed to radiations; despite the efforts of various doctors, no cure is in sight. This bodily transformation doesn't do much to his mind: though many times smaller, Scott still is pervaded by the same desires (mostly sexual). In fact, if his situation irritates him at first, it's mainly since he becomes smaller than his wife - he feels more like a boy than a man. Financial problems resurface, as he can't work for his brother anymore. By being reduced to such a little size, he now has to think, something which he wasn't used to; predictably, it makes him uncomfortable. Less than one inch tall and the prisoner of his house's cave, the end seems near; but when the occasion of getting out arises, he can't resist and is lead by pure exhaltation, no longer afraid of death. After a night of sleep, he wakes up in a whole new world which marks the next step of his voyage. For this to be possible, his body had to be reduced to... almost nothing.
Rating: 
Summary: One of Matheson's Genuine Classics
Review: There is an element of sci-fi in everything Matheson writes. This is his most straightforward science-fiction offering. It is also his thematically richest.Matheson's protagonists are men who become isolated and besieged, and have to discover wellsprings of courage within themselves in order to overcome. In The Shrinking Man, the protagonist virtually undergoes an entire odyssey of adventure and self-discovery. Trapped in an ever-diminshing body, he first has to come to grips with his family and the world, and then reluctantly abandon them as his increasingly diminutive stature literally sweeps him out of their world and into a new one - more than once. Recommended for anyone, not just fans of sci-fi.
Rating:
Summary: One of Matheson's Genuine Classics
Review: There is an element of sci-fi in everything Matheson writes. This is his most straightforward science-fiction offering. It is also his thematically richest. Matheson's protagonists are men who become isolated and besieged, and have to discover wellsprings of courage within themselves in order to overcome. In The Shrinking Man, the protagonist virtually undergoes an entire odyssey of adventure and self-discovery. Trapped in an ever-diminshing body, he first has to come to grips with his family and the world, and then reluctantly abandon them as his increasingly diminutive stature literally sweeps him out of their world and into a new one - more than once. Recommended for anyone, not just fans of sci-fi.
Rating:
Summary: After almost 50 years-still a good book
Review: This is a very good book to read. The conflicts that go on in the story simultaneously are very good. Sometimes it jumped back in time, instead of staying with the spider story as I wanted it to, but it was all very well done. The emotions of the title character were well done, although I didn't agree with him at times, or with the things he did, it was just my perspective on it. The ending was a little neat to me. It ended a little different than I would have originally guessed. I enjoyed this book. It is very well done. It is ageless in the fact, that it was written 50 yrs ago, but could easily be placed in todays world. The characters and they way they react are timeless.
Rating:
Summary: Going Down in the World
Review: This is the second novel I've read by Richard Matheson, the first being his other well-known book "I Am Legend". The book cover says it all: after a freak encounter with radiation, Scott Carey begins to shrink. Scott has been surviving in the basement, a hostile, Dali-esque environment where the only neighbour is a menacing black widow spider. Like all people troubled by the miseries of the present, Scott's mind frequently turns back to the past. These flashbacks chart the course of Scott's diminishing height, beginning with the anger and humiliation of total dependence, the loneliness of being a national spectacle, and the inexorable retreat into a nightmare world. "The Shrinking Man" has much in common with "I Am Legend". We have the lone protagonist, an outcast, cut off and isolated from everything that was once safe and familiar. Both characters are trapped in their respective predicaments, virtual prisoners with no hope of reprieve. Like Robert Neville, Scott Carey also had a wife and daughter. While Robert's family succumbed to a plague of vampirism, Scott's family seemed to be turning into "giants". Robert Neville was armed with a wooden stake, hoping to kill his tormentor Ben Cortman - Scott is armed with a sewing pin, hoping to dispatch the persistent spider. Scott's dimunition is constant. He is literally going where no man has gone before. Eventually he'll be able to see germs without a microscope, and perhaps see what atoms really look like. Maybe he'll even be able to see the miniature solar systems inside them. Didn't William Blake say something about the universe being a grain of sand? In the film adaptation of "A Stir of Echoes" the babysitter reads a copy of "The Shrinking Man" - a little in-joke on the script writer's part. It's easy to see how Stephen King was influenced by Matheson's work, particularly in books like "Salem's Lot" or "Thinner". There really is no such thing as originality. Everything comes from something else. It's just a matter of good story-telling.
Rating:
Summary: Early Matheson and one of his best!
Review: This was the first novel by Matheson that I ever read, in a paperback edition, back in the mid-50s. He was already well-known for his short stories in the sci-fi/fantasy pulp magazines of the day, and even in the "slicks" like Playboy, and I had read some of them. This was the first work of his to be made into a movie in 1957, The Incredible Shrinking Man (I guess they thought the original title, The Shrinking Man, was too credible?) directed by the late, great Jack Arnold (It Came from Outer Space, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Tarantula, et al.) but it wasn't the last. Most of his novels and some of his short stories have made it to the big screen (The Omega Man) or to TV (The Night Stalker). He was the Stephen King of the `50s and `60s! I read this novel before I saw the movie, and although the movie was great, with stand-out special effects, a very good cast, and tight direction, it of course had to leave out quite a lot. The character Scott Carey certainly had some interesting and unusual problems, and his fate is finally to enter the microscopic world, where the unknown waits. The Shrinking Man is a great read, and I recommend it to all sci-fi/horror fans, and certainly all Matheson fans.
Rating:
Summary: Early Matheson and one of his best!
Review: This was the first novel by Matheson that I ever read, in a paperback edition, back in the mid-50s. He was already well-known for his short stories in the sci-fi/fantasy pulp magazines of the day, and even in the "slicks" like Playboy, and I had read some of them. This was the first work of his to be made into a movie in 1957, The Incredible Shrinking Man (I guess they thought the original title, The Shrinking Man, was too credible?) directed by the late, great Jack Arnold (It Came from Outer Space, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Tarantula, et al.) but it wasn't the last. Most of his novels and some of his short stories have made it to the big screen (The Omega Man) or to TV (The Night Stalker). He was the Stephen King of the '50s and '60s! I read this novel before I saw the movie, and although the movie was great, with stand-out special effects, a very good cast, and tight direction, it of course had to leave out quite a lot. The character Scott Carey certainly had some interesting and unusual problems, and his fate is finally to enter the microscopic world, where the unknown waits. The Shrinking Man is a great read, and I recommend it to all sci-fi/horror fans, and certainly all Matheson fans.
Rating:
Summary: Sounds like a B-movie, right?
Review: Yes, it does sound like a B-movie and the movie that resulted from the book does not even begin to do justice to the intricacies of the book. Matheson did not hold this book in high regards, but Kafka himself asked his closest friend to burn his works after he died, so maybe the work comes to outgrow even the artist. This book appears to be about the external, after all what could be a more external problem than shrinking an inch a week? However, the real story takes place inside the mind of Scott Carey. You see the depression and frustration which Carey has at the reality that he is shrinking. But this story is ultimately redemptive, and once you read the end you will realize why. This book is just an example of how good Matheson really is. Works like I Am Legend, and What Dreams May Come(that rare case where the movie and book are both masterpieces) are other examples of Matheson's skill as a storyteller. The additional stories included in the Tor edition of The Shrinking Man are equally brillant with Mantage and Duel coming to mind immediately. I have read a number of Matheson's short stories, they are what introduced me to this writer in the first place, and so far I have not read a bad short story from this writer. Matheson is one of those rare finds, that of a truly great writer. Don't just read this book, read everything you can find by Matheson. {Buyer Beware: You may want to start with Hell House rather than this work. See my review of Hell House for reasons why.}
Rating:
Summary: I think you are getting the father and son confused
Review: Yikes! You have this book by a 3-year old, and another, his, by his father! Please straighten out Richard [Burton] Matheson and his son, Richard Christian Matheson!
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