cover image Leave Yesterday Alone and Musings

Leave Yesterday Alone and Musings

Richard Matheson. Gauntlet (www.gauntletpress.com), $24.95 (376p) ISBN 978-1-934267-40-0

Matheson (1926%E2%80%932013) died with a number of works still unpublished, including the two collected in this volume. "Leave Yesterday Alone," written in 1950 (just before Matheson's first professional science fiction sale), is a pulp novel about college student Erick Linstrom and his on-again, off-again relationship with friendly, sexy Sally Birch, whom he holds at arm's length for fear that a serious relationship will stifle his ambitions as a writer. Though unremarkably written, it might have held its own among the paperback-original potboilers published in its day. "Musings" is an autobiographical journal that Matheson kept between 1994 and 2003 to record recollections of his childhood years in Brooklyn and his career as a novelist and screenwriter. This book is strictly for Matheson's legion of fans, who will enjoy acquainting themselves with the man he was before he earned his literary reputation with works such as I Am Legend. (Feb. 24)