Richard Matheson (1926-2013) was a prolific speculative fiction author and screenwriter who wrote novels, short stories, movie screenplays, and scripts for television. He is perhaps best known for I Am Legend, a novel that was translated to the silver screen twice-once starring Charlton Heston, and once starring Will Smith. His screenplay The Incredible Shrinking Man, based on a prior novel, won the Hugo Award in 1958. Several other novels of Matheson's have been adapted to film, including What Dreams May Come, A Stir of Echoes, Duel, and Hell House. The movie version of Duel, based on a Matheson short story of the same name, was directed by Steven Spielberg. He is also known for writing dozens of episodes for The Twilight Zone, including the iconic "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet," and several popular Star Trek episodes, including "The Enemy Within."
In addition to the Hugo Award, Richard Matheson was the recipient of the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement (1984) and an Edgar Award for a teleplay written for The Night Stalker. He was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2010.
The work The Link began as a 557-page outline that Richard Matheson wrote for a proposed twenty-hour ABC mini-series in the late 1970s. The ABC executives asked Matheson to shorten the series into seven hours but after Matheson had written three hours of the series, the two parted company. Matheson’s original vision could not be condensed without destroying the essence of the plot and characters. Here in The Link is the original outline, in narrative form, in publication for the first time.
The story follows Robert Allright as he explores his own demons as well as those of psychics past as he also struggles to decipher his father’s dying wish to explore an archeological dig in Arizona. Allright’s only clue is the mystifying crystal that his father believes is the key to a great discovery.
At 32, Chris Martin lives a conventional life. He’s married with a daughter, runs his own small business, and is working to save up money for a bigger home with his wife, Helen. He is happy and content with this staid but comfortable existence—until a late weeknight phone call turns everything upside down.
Chris hasn’t always been the model family man he appears to be. And when his past catches up to him, the terror comes into his home—just where he thought he was safest. As Chris finds all that he loves under attack, he must go to heroic lengths to keep his family and his life together.
