The Road

Cormac McCarthy


I unfortunately do not have a quote from this book, perhaps it is for the best though. To take any line out of the narrative would be like showing only a single bullet flying through the air from an action movie. I have read a few books which latch on to you and pull you through them with great force. Generally they are quite terrible and there is some point where you become aware that you are merely cruising on because you want to get to the end of the book; somehow the actual reading has lost its enjoyment.
The Road is like this but better than such books. It is a book which you read to get to the end, but it does not sacrifice itself in the process. There were a few times when I looked up to catch the time and flipped absently at the pages to the right, gauging how much longer I would be at it, but these were not often. There were far more times when I flipped to the next page hurriedly because the narrative was burning me up.
McCarthy executes a style of withholding information which others would do well to learn from. It seems incredible that he could set up such a world full of complex fears and horrible, evil darkness and yet never actually let you see them. The whole book gives us the effects, but only rarely do we see the causes--and for good reason.
The Road is a dark book, darker than most I have recently read. As dark as any Stephen King. And I am glad he refrained from indulging his imagination enough to fully tell us why his characters are afraid. Set in some vague post-apocalyptic future, we see a world of floating ash and dreary desolation. But so much more depressing than the world are its few and deranged inhabitants. The Road marks the journey of a lonely father and his son across the vastness of this sad world towards some safety, some end. McCarthy captures very well the dynamic between these two strange figures as well as their mutual terror and scramble for survival. I do not recommend it if you are looking for something to uplift your spirits. It is morbid. But none the less, if you do pick it up you won't put it down. 6/10