terrifying, beautiful, and much more.
|
Just finished this powerful novel and it's rare that a book has such an effect. Raw, desolate and stark yet a tangible powerful beauty emits from the pages albiet in a horrific setting.
The end result is emotionally shattering and will stay with you for a time. Recomended - the best book i've read this year.
|
|
|
Superb
|
|
This is The Great American Novel. The Road is a magnificent book, and a true achievement. It is, quite simply, a modern masterpiece.
|
|
|
vivid and frightening
|
|
I found this book both terrifying and haunting in it's depiction of a world where everything has turned to ash and humanity is reduced to searching through the ruins for food and shelter. the relationship between the father and son is beautifully rendered and the seeming hopelessness of their situation makes you turn the page hoping for a less bleak future for them. fantatically written and thoroughly recommended.
|
|
|
Road to Nowhere
|
In a post-apocalypse America, a man and his son make their fraught journey across a barren, desolated landscape, covered in ash, ravaged by fire. The pair scavenge, seek shelter from rain, snow and fire, avoid the infrequent other survivors who may be `the good guys' but more often than not are brutes who have lapsed into savagery and cannibalism. The pair have no destination, beyond the fact that they are heading south for some non specific reason, their only purpose to stay alive.
As others have noted The Road certainly offers a stark warning of what may lie in store for a species whose values are rooted in `economic growth' and unsustainable exploitation of resources and majestically blinkered belief systems. But on the other hand, and what many seem to have missed, is that it is also a celebration of man's infinite appetite for survival and his unending resourcefulness. The father undertakes a remarkable project, teaching his son by example and passing on to him the absolute determination to soldier on in the face of despair and horror. Of course, what the reader is forced to ask him or herself is how you would you respond in this world. Would you be as resourceful and resilient as the father or despairing and suicidal like the mother?
The relationship between the father and son is so beautifully rendered, one feels the weight of responsibility that each of them carry. The dialogue is spare and minimal. "I'm okay" and "I don't know" are uttered over and over, the repetition nuanced by the context to indicate weary resignation or genuine confusion or understated concern. To me the ending was inevitable, and while heartbreaking, McCarthy I think gets it just right, being neither foolishly optimistic nor needlessly harsh. Of course, the long term future is not in question. The book makes it plain that all other forms of animal life have become extinct and that it is pretty much inevitable that the human species will shortly follow. However, the final paragraph describes not the blasted landscape of the future but provides a last glimpse of a lush and cool habitat blessed with life. Which future is ours?
Two inane issues raised by other reviewers need to be commented upon. Those complaining that the nature of the disaster that has befallen America (and by implication the rest of the world) is never made clear are missing the point by a country mile. There are hints and clues but ultimately it's irrelevant. And as for the idiots who moan about there being no quote marks around the speech I can only say read it again and PAY ATTENTION and perhaps widen your experience of literature a bit more. Quote marks are merely a convention that some writers choose to dispense with.
Anyway, leaving aside such petty matters, to conclude; This short novel is not unlike other end of the world scenarios which makes it nominally science fiction, I suppose. If you're hung up on labels then this may be an issue, but it shouldn't be. There's no way round it. The Road is a masterpiece. Easy to read and hard to forget.
|
|
|
Last Night on Earth
|
A nameless father and son travel through a post-apocalyptic America, trying to reach warmer climates in the south. A disaster has fallen upon the human race and what we witness are the final days of man before the lights go out. All animals and plants have died; the sun doesn't shine anymore thanks to grey ash covering the sky and raining on the ground; and the few people still alive have reverted to the kind of barbarism that not even Stephen King dares explore in his novels.
Although this was a short, poetic page-turner, I had trouble reading it. I had to choose times of the day when I could tackle the book (NEVER at night, before bedtime); and many times I put down the book thanks to heart palpitations. However, I'll say that there is a glimmer of hope amidst all the desolation and horror, and that's what readers must cling to as they reach the end of this brilliant novel.
Unsurprisingly, a film version is already in the pipes; with "No Country for Old Men" winning the Oscars' last night, it now seems only a matter of time before most of McCarthy's books are given the celluloid treatment.
Oh, and I've said this once (and I'll say it again): Cormac McCarthy will be the next American to win the Nobel for Literature.
|
|
|
United States | 
United Kingdom | 
Canada