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A powerful prediction
Cormac McCarthy is surley taking a departure here from his usual motif. Maybe now that he is older and wiser and seeing life in a more enlightened perspective, we can see another side to this brilliant author. Surely this is an unusual and perhaps, prescient take on where we are going as a species. One can only imagine. No, this is not exactly a pleasant read. But it is an egaging and I believe, an important one. In fact, I was fixated. Bleak though it is, this is a story that brings one to ask these important questions while every day, we are hearing about the earth's depletion in one way or another. Although a big departure form works like BLOOD MERIDIAN and ALL THE PRETTY HORSES, McCarthy's latest was certainly worth my time. A unique read that makes you think. Also recommend the little known, SIM0N LAZARUS, a highly entertaining and thought-provoking novel more should know about.Intense, beautifully written novel; in a word, "wow"...
The Road was my first stab at reading Cormac McCarthy (author of No Country for Old Men, All The Pretty Horses, Child of God), and it was, in a word, intense. In one of the more incredibly contrasting works I've ever read, McCarthy beautifully describes a wretched world, where a father and son traverse a large, unspecified section of the United States, in post-apocalyptic times. The father and son, who are nameless throughout the book, walk this road in hopes of making their way to the coast where the possibility of a better, safer life exists. The Road details their journey of survival in a lawless land, cataloguing their few triumphs and many pitfalls along the way. As you can guess, the book is dark and depressing -- very dark and depressing -- as most post-apocalyptic tales are. Though The Road is unquestionably sad and dreary, McCarthy's writing is stunningly simple and beautiful. Never has death and destruction so eloquently been captured, and it's no wonder McCarthy won the Pulitzer for his creation of The Road. In unique fashion, McCarthy purposely strips out most of the core elements of a novel -- names of characters and places, dates, situations (i.e. any mention of a "nuclear holocaust"), so you're left with just these anonymous people trying to get by in some freakishly awful environment (where ash blocks out the sun and covers everything else). McCarthy even leaves out punctuation in his sentences, leaving the reader with nothing but an unpolished, rough-edged diamond that is impossible to put down. I found all of McCarthy's descriptions and accounts of his characters and their situations absolutely breathtaking, but I most enjoyed the way McCarthy chronicles the relationship between The Road's two main characters -- the father and son. Their loving bond is what makes their journey possible, and only McCarthy could construct such a beautiful, poignant relationship amidst such a hellish backdrop... a remarkable feat. I highly recommend picking up The Road, even if you don't normally read darker, disturbing material. It's like nothing you've ever absorbed, and you'll find yourself tearing through the pages to get to the end. And once you finish, you'll definitely call your mom.Raw, stripped-down emotion in literary form
I read "All the Pretty Horses" several years ago. I thought the writing was stilted, and the patented Cormac McCarthy punctuation "thing" was gimmicky and...well, just plain goofy. I formed the opinion that McCarthy was an OK writer, not at all my cup o' tea, but just a cut above average. I never imagined that Mr. McCarthy's writing would pack such an emotional sucker punch that I'd find myself weeping and tiptoeing into my son's room at 2:00am (when I finished "The Road") just to be close to him. "The Road" isn't about a post-apocalyptic road trip with gangs of Mad Max-esque marauders on motorcycles (complete with punk hairdos and assless chaps). What the book is "about" doesn't really lend itself to descriptions of scenes, and plotlines, and characters; it's not that sort of novel. It's pure, undiluted prose is about as close as you can get to expressions of absolute emotion in the written word. What "The Road" is about is fathers and sons, and love, and hope; all the rest of it is window dressing.The Old Man And The Sea on downers & under greyest skies
As good a book as I have ever read. A compelling, page turner that reads like a dystopian Old Man And The Sea (Scribner Classics) on downers and under greyest skies.A beautiful book
This is a beautiful book, one of the best I have read in the last years.Keyword : textbook
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