The Road: Pulitzer Prize Winner (Vintage International)

Great storytelling and prose style. This book reminded me to consciously appreciate: Warmth, sunlight, availability of food especially when it's fresh, safety and a basically ordered society, living rather than just surviving from day to day, home and a stable existence - all so easy to take for granted. The father-son relationship is fundamental to this story of course. Not an easy read but paradoxically beneficial.

Cormac McCarthy’s bleak, heart-breaking post-apocalytic novel of the remaining few survivors, scrabbling towards the final, dying days of a wasted, destroyed planet, some time in the very near future would have been a sombre, regret filled read at any time. But in these days where the Presidential Office is filled by an erratic, self-obsessed and unreflective man, McCarthy’s book seems far less fictional than might be comfortable. Less allegorical and possibly more prophetic. I hope not. The ‘event’ some ten years ago in the past is never spelled out, but, there was a blinding flash, there were sonic reverberations, and people burned, disfigured. Some kind of nuclear winter appears to have occurred. Almost all living things have now ceased to be – vegetation, insects, birds, mammals, most humans. Pockets of survivors, feral, cannibalistic exist in the unnamed place, somewhere in America, where the novel takes place. The central characters are a man, and his child, a boy who is probably now 10 years old. His mother is no longer living, and why, will be revealed. The father looks back to a time before the event, before his son was born, before the world was catapulted into these dark days. His son is his reason for living, he has been charged, he charges himself, to take care of his boy. Some years after the cataclysm, and all the available food sources (whatever there was, canned), in houses, in stores, across the world, have all been looted by whatever survivors there were. Most have long since, horribly, died, but those small bands who remain – are they people of decency and humanity, or are they those who now regard other humans merely as food, offering a few more weeks and months of survival for those who kill them? Bleak days, little hope. And yet, McCarthy offers us a strong love, some relic of who we might have been, when we seemed to ourselves to be evolution’s finest flower. There is the tenderness and dependence of father and son upon each other, as they walk a road ‘South’ in search of warmer weather Practical tasks occupy the pages. Scavenging odd discovered stores of tinned food, clothing, rags to bind round feet, wheeling all these worldly goods in abandoned supermarket trolleys. Balancing the need for fire and warmth with the possibly dangerous signals given out by smoke. The reader knows the father and his son are ailing, infections taking hold, breathing laboured. The outcome is bleak, cannot be good, for either. Nonetheless, there is also something about the child. He has a kind of holy innocence about him. He might be a kind of naïve fool – or the repository of human wisdom, not intellectually, but in goodness, in kindness, in tenderness and that so sullied thing ‘humanity’ Time and time again he rather sets a moral compass for the father to orientate towards There are many, sometimes subliminal nods to religious imagery, and I thought this a kind of journey through an anti-Garden Of Eden, where nothing grows, but the child might be – possibly a new kind of ‘Adam’. “It took two days to cross that ashen scabland. The road beyond ran along the crest of a ridge where the barren woodland fell away of every side. It’s snowing, the boy said. He looked at the sky. A single gray flake sifting down. He caught it in his hand and watched it expire there like the last host of Christendom” McCarthy does the reader the great service of keeping a kind of ambivalence going in the story. We know how the story must end, realistically, without appeal to any kind of magic, corn, or unsatisfying tied up wrap. But, isn’t life itself something evolving? There have been earlier cataclysms which destroyed life as it was known. Didn’t other forms arise? Might a conscious, a self-conscious species, be able, some of them, to choose to be some kind of bearers of light? I found the concepts, the far wider considerations McCarthy was presenting the reader, kept me engaged and absorbed, as did the practical details. Father and son, and particularly, that relationship between them, and the father’s memories of ‘before’ were all extremely powerful. And, often his writing is magnificent, carrying his weighty themes, particularly in his chilling descriptions of the new, harshly wasted world “The land was gullied and eroded and barren. The bones of dead creatures sprawled in the washes. Middens of anonymous trash. Farmhouses in the fields scoured of their paint and the clapboards spooned and sprung from the wallstuds. All of it shadownless and without feature. The road descended through a jungle of dead kudzu. A marsh where the dead reeds lay over the water. Beyond the edge of the fields the sullen haze hung over earth and sky alike” Despite these undoubted strengths I sometimes struggled with McCarthy’s writing. He has a tendency to a kind of portentous elevation, using archaic language – and then over-using it. As example, he carefully seems to want to avoid using the word ‘wash’ replacing it with ‘lave’ Using an unusual or poetic word like that, once or twice, helps the feeling of strangeness. But if every time something – hand, face, hair, knife is not washed, but is laved, it becomes grating and repetitive in a way the reader would not have noticed if the common word had been used over and again, for a common action Still, a very powerful read indeed

THE ROAD McCarthy needs no real introduction , one of the modern greats in American literature . Winner of countless awards ( including the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction) . The Novel itself is set in an undisclosed time though it appears to be set in the very near future . The world has suffered a catastrophe resulting in the breakdown of civilisation , It is in this setting we are introduced to 'the man' and 'the boy' . We follow these 2 characters as they travel south across the US , away from their previous lives and the encroaching winter . And that is essentially it in way of plot , McCarthy doesn't explain anything about the state of the country or world at large after the event, we are told little of what has happened to society other than that it has descended into chaos, yet none of this diminishes the novel. The story pans out in small dialogues between the father and his son, or little vignettes a few lines long , what makes this so engaging is the absolutely beautiful prose . McCarthy manages to put an exceptional amount of emotion into such spartan text , you feel their concern for each other, their futures and their feelings towards the lives they left behind. We see then struggle onwards towards their destination , searching the picked bare remnants of America for simple things like food and clothing (one of the most touching scenes in the entire novel comes with the man finding something we all take for granted for his son) . The Road is not a large book, the Picador UK edition comes in at around 300 pages long, but its even smaller than this modest page count due stripped back nature of the text ( pages go by with one liners back and forth between the man and boy) . It can be read in a matter of hours, certainly easily in only a few days, but I promise it will stay with you for far far longer. At it's core it's a book about the depth of feeling between 2 people, the bond between and father and son and how this bond pulls them thorough time and time again when everything and everyone around them is sinking into ruin. The Road is a thought provoking , emotional and consummately atmospheric novel , It is a bleak novel and I doubt anyone would finish it and say it was a fun read, BUT , it is a novel you must read, you would be doing yourself a disservice if you didn't . 10/10 Simply stunning.

I knew very little about Cormac Mcarthy prior to reading this book. I'm going through a phase of consuming post apocalyptic stories and after much deliberation I thought I'd give it try. I'm so glad I wasn't put off by some of the negative reviews. The Road is beautiful, thought provoking, compelling and life affirming. I hesitate to say it was a pleasure to read given the tone and subject matter but I recommend this book to anyone who is prepared to engage their brain and open their heart. McCarthy's writing emotionally tied me to the characters without the usual writing conventions I'd expect, life doesn't necessarily provide us with nice neat answers or resolutions to things especially in this case where nothing is normal and will never be so again. Why worry about fripperies when all human life has been cleaved down to the barest essentials, the novel's style and prose reflects that in many ways. I was fully immersed in the story from the start, it's not a long book, it was easy to follow the various exchanges and the story flowed beautifully. But be warned it's emotionally draining and very bleak, it hurt my heart to read some of the passages, this truly frightening world McCarthy brought forth will live me for a long time. Forget the whys and wherefores of how the earth reached this hellish state, that's honestly not important. The Road is basically a love story between a man and his son, McCarthy dedicates this book to his own little boy at the start and it's abidingly clear that the primary focus for the reader should be on this relationship and its development, it positively burns through the pages. Man and boy are nameless (as are most of the characters we meet) but it didn't lessen the power of his writing to convey the incredible depth of their love and reliance on each other. What we do learn is that there was an apocalyptic event around the time of the boy's birth, its clear the effects were utterly devastating, life appears to have been extinguished save for a few pitiless souls left to walk the barren ash choked wasteland killing, stealing and scavenging for what's left of any canned/preserved food or worse resorting to cannibalism. They trudge day after day through a world that appears stripped of life, of colour and a future for humankind. The boy knows nothing of the time before the tragedy, living in constant fear, cold and hunger for him is normality for the father it's much worse, a desperate sadness at what has been lost that he is loathe to articulate, he remembers his old life in dreams and brief recollections and it's from these that we get further insights into the past with his wife and family. The man is getting sicker by the day as they travel through the seemingly eternal grey, bleak, inhospitable, cold wasteland along a road. There is no sun, they are fighting constant starvation, the days are growing darker and colder as if heralding a nuclear style winter. They are moving south towards the coast as the father knows they can't survive another winter where they've been living. It's better for the father to have some goal to reach in order to hold on to his sanity and hope for the future and his son's well being so they keep on the move. Hope, humanity, goodness and faith are key here it's about "keeping the fire" as the father calls it, they are "the good guys" and his son demands reassurance of this fact at various stages and this sustains both of them despite the apparent desperateness of their situation. The father is deeply mistrusting of anyone they meet with his fearsome desire to protect his child who he looks up to almost as a vessel of goodness in this hellish world. When certain incidents happen the boy gets very upset and begins to fear they are no longer the good guys, this schism reflects more on the general fear of any parent desperately wanting to equip their child with the tools for survival and independence but fighting the need to control and fiercely protect. To compound the issue, the father realises he's running out of time but equally the son carries the burden of knowing that soon he will be left alone to fend for himself, this forms an unbearable emotional strain between them. The tenderness the father expresses towards his son was deeply moving, despite the sparseness of the dialogue between them, the father is only still alive because of his son who is equally dependent on him. His fear and anguish over the boy at key moments almost had me in tears, the future is left opaque and undecided, it may be hopeless it may not, the reader is left to surmise for themselves many things and that's how it should be. McCarthy's gift in his writing is to keenly show in a very painful and raw way how loving someone can be and that the strength found in that is sometimes enough to carrying on. The rather stark, simple exchanges between father and son I found curiously moving and heartfelt and there are many touching little moments described. Also, the father is constantly tormented wondering if the time comes could he kill his child to spare him almost certain defilement. I can only imagine how much this story would resonate and especially if you're a parent. "You have my whole heart", the father says at one point, such simple honest beauty in that line! The Road shows us the strength of love and how in our darkest moments it can bind and hold people together against extreme circumstances that should crush the human spirit. Yet some if us choose to go on even if in the end the universe makes our existence appear almost meaningless. I can see why this book won acclaim.

I found The Road to be a mixed bag, with many good and bad aspects. The book is set in a post-apocalyptic scenario in the aftermath of a Doomsday event in which most of Earth's life supporting capacity has been destroyed along with most life. The story follows a father and son as they attempt to negotiate this dystopian nightmare as they encounter hunger, cold and loneliness, other hostile survivors, as well as their own inner psychological struggles with hopelessness, loss and fear. The narrative is highly atmospheric, McCarthy does a brilliant job in capturing the visual descriptions of civilisations wreckage as well as the emotional abyss enveloping both the main father character as the attempt to make enough sense from such chaos to negotiate and survive its aftermath. The world's cold indifference to the characters' plight is illustrated very well as the pair struggle with sickness as well as the father's progressively degenerating health as he succumbs to a developing cancer as a result of the toxic environment. The ruthless dog-eat-dog situations encountered during the book are truly gripping, most typified when the pair discover several instances of gruesome cannibalism, as well as violent scenes in which the father has to commit (sometimes vengeful) acts of violence in order to secure their own survival. The 'would you do the same?' moral sub-text is subtly woven throughout the novel and the father's mental struggles with the loss of his wife are vividly captured and add a layer of complexity to the character similar to the way that The Walking Dead portrays Rick's own burdens of insecurity, guilt and metal strain. With that said, I would not read this book again. The repeated theme of single line dialogue ending in 'Okay' began to get very tiresome early on in the book, this only gets worse the further into the book you read. It highlights a certain shallowness to the book, it feels as though it is only narrative, with some typical literary intellectualising added in an attempt to provide some colour. However it does not work and the book left me feeling like there was something missing. The book almost seems like it was written with the intention of being made into the film adaptation, certainly the lack of depth and simple narrate would be suited to it, and I do find myself becoming more immersed the film than the book, something that always seems to me to be a sign of bad story telling since the novel format gives freer reign for description and literary/psychological exploration. This could all just be due to the limited cast of characters and the one-dimensional nature of the survival situation that the characters were in which makes it hard to generate a deeper vibrant story, or it could just a product of my own interaction with the story from a personal taste standpoint. All in all, it is worth a read, but I would only read it once. The film adaptation is very good though and I highly recommend it. The Road A great similar story is The Stand by Stephen King, which is one of the best works in this genre. The Stand

Post apocalyptic novels can be fairly standard fare, drawing on desolate landscapes and scavenging survivors. There is usually a keen sense of today - make amends now, you can see it coming. The only drift in reasoning is the move from nuclear wasteland to climate change with a whole host of contemporary authors from Atwood (Oryx and Crake) to Jim Crace (The Pesthouse) jumping to tell the consequences. All to their credit give us the insight and the horror in different measures. The Road is by far the most straightforward in its simplicity, masking some true horror with redemption for humankind, struggling beneath the surface. Please do not open its pages lightly; it is a pure ride of emotion with images and scenes that will live with you for a while to come. In between you might be stupefied by the journey of a man and his son struggling to survive in the burnt wasteland of America. Not a great deal happens. You could class 101 ways to keep warm and find food as repetitive but just take a moment to place yourself in the characters' (cold) feet and your compassion will be found. It's amazingly gripping. You are there. And no, you cannot see the climax coming a mile off and no, it's not a big plot buster twist, and it's not moralising but true and natural and well said. For once, there is a genuine reason why so many reviewers' comments litter the cover of this book; but they do not do it justice for the personal journey you will take from its story. It is a book that deserves to be read by everybody and for that, a book that every reader, whatever their preferences will enjoy, take to heart and ultimately recommend to everyone they know. The Road is told in few words but you'd be hard pressed not to be moved to realise the simple joy of what we have now. A brilliant novel and possibly the most direct and sublime read you'll ever have. A truly majestic book. Please, read now.

I bought a copy of The Road in 2008 whilst reading one of the earlier apocalyptic stories written in the 1950s: The Death of Grass, John Christopher (1956). Having ordered the DVD of The Road for rental, I decided I should like to read the novel first, since I wanted to employ my own imagination on the writing first, before having the film's visual imprint burned into my memory. Before reading the book, I was not sure what to expect, despite having read some of the reviews on this site. I was not disappointed. This is the first book by Cormac McCarthy which I have read and although I have already seen the film, I am now curious to read No Country for Old Men. I am surprised however that this work won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize; not because it is a bad piece of writing, but rather it does not strike me as such an outstanding work of fiction. Having dismissed my negatives, I do think this is an important book to read. I do not share the views of the environmentalist, George Monbiot when he wrote in the Guardian that ". . . it could be the most important environmental book ever." However, I do sense that this is a book which forces one to contemplate the realities of a world without "a biosphere"; or to put it more bluntly, a world with no life, except for a handful of humans whose existence is dependent upon exercising the most brutal of Darwinian laws. The storyline of much of this book has been told elsewhere, including amongst the various reviews on this site. For me the power of this book was that it grabbed you and drew you into this post-apocalyptic world. I read the first 50 pages one evening and read the remaining 250 pages the following afternoon and early evening. Although I have read adequate scientific and fictional material on the nature of nuclear warfare and their aftermath to be well aware of their horror and stupidity, nevertheless, this book really brought alive that world after such a catastrophe. The book does not spell out the cause of the environmental devastation (it could be climatic change, it could have been a major meteorite impact, it might have been a nuclear exchange); it is not really relevant. The story is about a father and his son trying to survive in such a barren landscape, whatever the cause. The value of the story may be left to the reader to decide. It can be seen in the genre of the 'road journey' by a father and son whose relationship unfolds over time; however, I think it is impossible to divorce this particular journey from the environment around them, for this is what shapes them as survivors with a particular set of values. Values which for most of the other survivors seem to have disolved along with most of the landscape's life. For me, apart from the focus upon the plight of the two protagonists, the power and value of this book lay in its forcing one to reflect upon the precious nature of the world around us that we take for granted every day. There are of course people living today whose existence is not much easier than the those in the book. People who die due to starvation, people who die due to the homicidal actions of their fellow beings in war zones; all of these could relate to the plight of the protagonists. However, for those of us surrounded by the relative security of modern lifestyles and comforts, the opportunity to immerse oneself in a world where everything has been destroyed and a can of beans is not only a luxury, but a potential life saver, where every stranger is probably a killer - it reminds one very vividly how precious and fragile our world really is. In that sense, I agree with Monbiot. It takes less imagination when reading 'The Road' to envision this world, but nevertheless, when Silent Spring was published in 1962 its message on this topic was just as powerful.

This is a beautiful and tragic story. On the man and the boy's adventure, they are physically and mentally tested each day. Hope and human's morals tested in each moment. Superb