Morgue Anne's Reviews > I Am Legend

** spoiler alert ** I just finished reading this book. Completely different from the movie (The 2007 version), I wish they would have gone with this story instead. The reader spends the whole story (Which is really only 170 pages) following the last man on earth as he fights for his survival against vampires (and yes, they are vampires). He boards up his house, stocks up on canned goods, and researches a way to combat this disease. He is not a doctor or a scientist, just a regular man stuck in an irregular situation. But, as Matheson so beautifully states, "Man can get used to anything", and so he does - burning corpses left on his doorstep by his vampire "friends", gathering fresh garlic, and fixing up his house for them to come back each night and try to drag him out.
Robert, the main character, spends years in this manner. He breaks into a nearby library and gathers an armload of books on anything and everything he thinks will be useful. In this way, Richard Matheson gives us the first realistic look at vampires from a scientific standpoint. Some vampires are afraid of crosses because of experiences in their pre-infected life. None can stand garlic - but it must be fresh and strongly scented. The reason they turn to dust? Well, read and find out. Learning the few ways there are to destroy them, Robert makes an attempt to kill a handful each day.
**SPOILER**
What he doesn't realize is that these creatures are not mindless zombies. They have emotions and desires beyond that of fresh blood. While Robert spends his nights locked away in his home, the infected have set about creating their own society. The most heart-wrenching moment (A phrase I do not use lightly) comes when a female vampire looks at Robert and tells him "I had a husband. You killed him while he was sleeping." They are not the blood-thirsty monsters he believes them to be. In fact, in their world, *he* is the monster, and that is where the book gains it's title. "I Am Legend" is like saying "I Am Boogeyman". A fantastic look at who the monsters of this world really are.