The Road (Oprah's Book Club)

This is abook that inspires a lot of different opinions. I always enjoy reading the One Star reviews of books that I love to keep me honest about my biases.

There are lots of One Star reviews of The Road and I don't for a second think they're wrong. This book does NOT have an intricate plot. The punctuation is unconventional. The dialogue is sparse. The mood is consistently bleak. The details of the horrible post-nuclear circumstances are never explained.

So why are so many people so touched by it? For me, it simply hits all of my overwhelming, instinctive, crazy parental fears about protecting my children. It scores an absolute, direct hit on how much I love my children and to what lengths I would go to protect them.

I relate to every agonizing step that the father and son take and I was completely emotionally bought in while reading the book.

I've purchased this book as a gift for many people and talked to many others about it. Most people, like me, love the book, read it very quickly and are on pins and needles for the entire novel. It is a harrowing read. One friend described completing the book while at her daughter's swimming class and completely breaking down crying upon finishing.

There are a couple of people I know who simply didn't relate and didn't really care for it. One friend told me he was halfway through and wondered if anything was going to happen.

This is a story of a father and son and their struggle in unimaginable circumstances. If you're not gripped within the first 20 pages then maybe it's not for you.

I loved it and it really is one of my favourites of all time.

They were cold, they were freezing, they walked the road in the rain, they walked the road in the snow, they walked the road in the slush, they walked the road, they walked the road. Does this sound tedious? So was the book. I guess I am one if the illiterate who don't appreciate what an incredible book this is. It is incredible alright, incredibly bad! They walk, they camp. Repeatedly on the verge of starvation they find enough food and supplies to continue to walk. I could go on and on as this short book also goes on and on and on. Others have already discussed the lack of coherent sentences, punctuation, senseless words, and the trite ending.

I am annoyed with myself that I wasted $8 on this book. I have read several MCarthy's books, the last being "Blood Meridian" where they were cold, wet, freezing while they rode in the rain, they rode in the snow, they rode in the slush, they rode, they rode........Only 300+ pages of senseless violence to brake up the tedium while they rode. This is the last book of his I will bother reading.

I first read this book a couple of years ago. Recently, I had occasion to revisit it. I remembered the basic plot. I remembered the gore. But as I read it again, I wasn't certain why I had liked it so much. It's so dreary. Always snowing or, as they move "south," raining. Always cold. There's shocking cruelty. Everybody is utterly miserable. But as I approached the end, I remembered what makes the book so great. It's the conclusion. Of course, I won't spoil it.

This is the story of a father and son who are never named. The boy appears to be about ten. The book is largely about the father's unflinching love for his son. The father is a good man, one of the "good guys," who will do (almost) anything to survive and protect his son.

The father is a remarkably patient man who answers his son's many questions. The father is a great teacher, a regular Socrates, and his voice is loud and clear in the book.

Another key theme is survival. Much of the world has been destroyed by some fiery holocaust caused by human greed. Ashes from this disaster still darken the sky and cover the world. The few people who remain must fight to stay alive, digging through trash that has already been scoured by countless others. Many of the survivors have become wretched souls, to say the very least.

A haughty grammarian might gripe about things like sentence fragments, missing punctuation, no quotation marks, and the like. Grammar rules are good in that they are designed to make writing coherent. Cormac McCarthy's writing is extremely coherent. For those who must have "proper" grammar, I suggest that you mark up your book with red ink, draw a lot of arrows, and add huge exclamation points where you are particulary shocked. I'll keep my book as is.

If you appreciate it when an author tries to do something different and create a story that you will remember then this is one of those.

Beautifully written, nicely paced, heartbreaking ending that perfectly underscores the love between the man and his son.

One of the best in a long time.

Some books are just books, while others can only be characterized as great literature. Cormac McCarthy's latest book, "The Road" is the latter.

From the very first page, McCarthy lets the reader know that he or she is about to embark on a journey entirely different than we've ever taken. Throughout the book, he deftly creates characters that elicit great empathy. When the man and his child are navigating the treacherous road, my heart ached for their plight, and oh, how I wished I could jump onto the pages to provide them with the latest provisions, escapes, or companionship they so desperately needed.

I shed tears many times while reading this masterpiece; sometimes I cried because of the plot elements, while other times I cried simply from the power and lyrical beauty of his words.

Even though I am typically disappointed when I watch movies that have been adapted from great books, I will be one of the first in line to see the movie version of "The Road" (and not only because Viggo Mortensen is starring in it!). I look forward to revisiting that phenomenal journey that Cormac McCarthy took me on.


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