Good thing I was pretty impressed with my latest book. I would have been fighting a serious tide of positive thoughts and critical praise. I first became aware of it when it was named one of the Best Books of 2006 by Time and People... since then, it has reached the masses thanks to being Oprah's latest book club selection... and last week it won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction... and its biggest endorsement yet, my blogger buddy Scott-O-Rama is reading along as well (don't worry I warned him this was coming... though I usuallly don't give much away plot-wise in these book recaps).
If you haven't figured it out... or glanced to your left... it's Cormac McCarthy's The Road. Despite being called one of greatest American authors alive today, this was my very first attempt at McCarthy (perhaps best known for All The Pretty Horses). While I don't mind a challenge, he had a reputation of being difficult to read... and has even compared to William Faulkner (and you know how I feel about that!)... so with that reputation and the omnipresent "so many books, so little time" scenario, it just never happened.
... and I'll be the first to admit, even after having the book in my hand I wasn't sure it was ever going to happen. Foolish or not, I decided not to read an excerpt on O's website or even page through it at the bookstore. It was going to be a leap of faith.
10 pages into it, I was wondering what the heck I had gotten myself into?!? I didn't quite grasp what was going on and his prose seemed much too "lyrical" for me. But whether I "got it" or not it was quick reading... so I continued on... and I am glad I did.
I don't know if it was just a matter of getting the rhythm of McCarthy's prose... or just waiting for things to gel plot-wise... but I got sucked in and started to understand what all the critical fuss was about (sidenote: after I finished the entire book, I re-read the first 20 or so pages... and I still found them difficult to read).
The story is not a happy one... an unnamed father and son walk "the" road through a post-apocalyptic America. Though we can certainly make a guess, the reader never knows the exact details of the what, why, and where of the devastation. I found this to be one of the more fascinating parts of the book, though for others it may be one one of the most frustrating aspects. A lot is left up to the reader and answers are in short supply. Is this ultimately a tale of despair or hope? The father often refers to themselves as the "good guys" fending off "bad guys" on the road, but what's really good and bad (or does either even exist) in this doomsday scenario? So a lot of good stuff to brood over... and ultimately it is one of those books that haunts you for a bit.
But back to the McCarthy's style... stick with it. It's very minimalistic/stark (much like the novel's landscape) and it does have a rhythm and poetic quality to it... unlike anything I have read before. If you have feared McCarthy like I did or had a bad past experience, the NY Times back-cover blurb calls The Road his "most readable" work. I have a hunch they know what they are talking about when it comes to McCarthy's body of work.
Often I like to pick out a favorite line from a book... this one was my keeper:
People were always getting ready for tomorrow. I didnt believe in that. Tomorrow wasnt getting ready for them. It didnt even know they were there.
I have read some very good books in my 2007 10K challenge and we aren't even to the halfway point yet... but I'm thinking The Road will be competing for a spot on my own year-end "best of" list.
2007 10K Reading Challenge: + 285 pages (Total Pages: 3693 pages)
I read the first paragraph (of your blog post... not the book), but I'm saving the rest for later.
Posted by: Scott-O-Rama | Thursday, April 26, 2007 at 08:40 PM