What I found most useful in this story is the sense of perspective, and how the POV character needn’t necessarily be the main character. The story is told from Morton Silkline’s perspective - the Director of a little cut-rate funeral home. While the story is his, I would argue that he …

Matheson uses a great focus technique to bring the reader into this story. The first four sections of “Mad House” are told in present tense, after which the story switches to the usual past tense. These first four sections, which cover only a few pages, are very special. They are tightly …

Telling a story from a child’s point of view is a challenge. Telling it in a child’s language is a challenge as well. This piece was a little difficult for me to get engaged with because of Matheson’s lack of punctuation and the poor grammar (both intentional). This has the feel of …