Book Review: The Road

This is the first time I've reviewed a book with the Blog Monster, so we're breaking new ground. Woohoo!

So, I read The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I read it because my Blog Buddy, Mrs. Chili, started an online book blog club, uh, thing...(Dark and Stormy Book Club) and the first book they read was The Street by Ann Petry, but I got confused.

Ok, not really...their first book was, of course, The Road. I had wanted to participate in their discussion of the book, but I was a little late getting it read. Hey! It was either create my new death ray, or read the book! You'll forgive me if I fall behind on my reading for the sake of world domination.

The Road follows a father and his son in a post-apocalyptic world. While my interest is in world domination, it was interesting to see what things may be like if the world governments don't pay me the $113,000,000,000,000.78 that I'm asking for, and I have to turn my death ray toward the Earth's core.

The father and son follow a road hoping to find something, someone to help them survive. The cold, gray world provides no sustenance, and the remaining humans are to be avoided, rather than embraced. I wouldn't recommend snuggling up with the cannibals and murderers you'll find in The Road.

The father and son struggle on referring to themselves as the "good guys" and talking about carrying "the fire". It's a story of hope, faith, and the endangered quality of humanity and goodness. Despite the warm fuzzy you can find in this very morose tale, and the dearth of radioactive mutants, it's a very good book...

BUT

Cormac McCarthy eschews standard grammar and punctuation conventions. No apostophe in sight. Sentence fragments scatter across the pages. My kingdom for a quotation mark! My wife was so distracted by the unconventional writing style, that she couldn't finish the book. So, if grammar, conventions, and style can pluck your attention away from the story and keep you from enjoying it, you probably want to pass this one by.

The following is an excerpt that I found quite interesting:

"A corpse in a doorway dried to leather. Grimacing at the day. He pulled the boy closer. Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.

You forget some things, dont you?

Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget."

Until next time, Live Evil, or Not At All.