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A review by thekingcrusoe
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
4.0
No Country For Old Men is - on a scale in which I incorporate *some* objectivity - a 4/5. On a pure enjoyment scale, and the shock that Chapter 9 hit me with, I debated (and initially did) rate this book 5 stars, but I am a stubborn motherfucker, and I will continue to be salty about the disregard for punctuation; there were also a couple of scenes where I was a little bit more lost than I think I was supposed to be, so there is SOME stuff holding the book back...
...but compared to The Road? This was a slam. fucking. dunk.
To be fair though, I did this mostly audio (about 80%), with the remainder being immersive. I firmly believe that the audiobook did a MASSIVE amount of heavy lifting, but when I think about it, even going back and reading The Road again with the audio (same narrator as this), probably still wouldn't yield a successful result, because at it's core, the story and the characters of No Country For Old Men are what REALLY got me this time.
In comparison, The Road has 2.5 characters (father, son, and the combination of everybody else in the book), and no story to speak of, and I was certainly NOT invested in any aspect of that one; the prose was simply what tipped me over into the hater camp.
This book - with the help of the the audio - was SOLID.
The characters? Well realized. The dialogue? Made the characters truly come alive. The setting? Immersively desolate - though not empty. The plot itself? At times confusing, but with some crazy gut punches and...payoff(?) that really had me thinking.
Where the end of my time with The Road saw me empty because it never truly filled me with anything substantial in the first place, No Country for Old Men left me empty because it ripped my abdomen out of my, er, abdomen.
Sheriff Bell is a fantastic framing for the story that starts the book with intrigue and ends it with frankly NO resolution - by design, and succeeding (the character feels no resolution to the tale being told, and so we don't either; it was a fantastic choice on McCarthy's end).
Llewelyn Moss is a great character that is both entirely relatable and not at all, and it makes him fascinating to follow, including through the eyes of Sheriff Bell and a couple of other characters in the story. This character has all of my favorite..."normal" interactions, including a scene where the dialogue and the back-and-forth with another girl was just SO DAMN ENDEARING, I couldn't help but love these characters and hope for them.
Anton Chigurh...well, there's not enough I can say about this villain. SUCH. A. GOOD. VILLAIN. Chilling, cold, terrifying. Every scene he was in - especially when he interacted with other people - very nearly had me shaking in my boots. Like...I honestly can't say anything more than that. He's so fucking good. An all time favorite FOR SURE, and singlehandedly the reason why I - and surely thousands of others - have second-guessed our desire to deal with strangers, especially in customer-service job positions.
It's really hard to talk about one of the KEY reasons I consider giving NCFOM 5 stars: Chapter 9. If you know, you know. If you don't? You might have to read. I could always include the moment in a spoiler section here, but I won't. I will in the video review I do - probably eyeing a February 2024 release - but it was just so...yeah.
It was a gut-punch, and it completely changed how I thought of both this book and McCarthy as a whole.
While I came out of The Road never wanting to touch this author again, I came out of this one (which, I should say, I only started because a friend (hi, Alo!) recommended I try it with audio after he enjoyed it when he, like me, greatly disliked The Road, and then also disliked Blood Meridian)...anyway, I came out of this book WANTing to read more.
Friends have been doing a McCarthy readalong of sorts. The Road was in October (I led that one); Blood Meridian was in November (I skipped that one); No Country for Old Men is December (I nearly skipped this, started on a whim); and the Border Trilogy will be January, February, and March.
I am now thinking I will join along for those 3 books in the trilogy the same way I did with this: some combination of audiobook and immersive reading.
But when it comes right down to it...I can't quite give justice to this book with this review. I'm sure my rambling here has been a wreck. And while I did only rate it 4 stars...I would not argue with a 5-star rating, and mostly only pulled 1 star out of stubborn principle.
I honestly, legitimately, recommend this book to anybody looking to try out McCarthy. It was absolutely worth it, and I'm very glad I gave this an honest shot.
...but compared to The Road? This was a slam. fucking. dunk.
To be fair though, I did this mostly audio (about 80%), with the remainder being immersive. I firmly believe that the audiobook did a MASSIVE amount of heavy lifting, but when I think about it, even going back and reading The Road again with the audio (same narrator as this), probably still wouldn't yield a successful result, because at it's core, the story and the characters of No Country For Old Men are what REALLY got me this time.
In comparison, The Road has 2.5 characters (father, son, and the combination of everybody else in the book), and no story to speak of, and I was certainly NOT invested in any aspect of that one; the prose was simply what tipped me over into the hater camp.
This book - with the help of the the audio - was SOLID.
The characters? Well realized. The dialogue? Made the characters truly come alive. The setting? Immersively desolate - though not empty. The plot itself? At times confusing, but with some crazy gut punches and...payoff(?) that really had me thinking.
Where the end of my time with The Road saw me empty because it never truly filled me with anything substantial in the first place, No Country for Old Men left me empty because it ripped my abdomen out of my, er, abdomen.
Sheriff Bell is a fantastic framing for the story that starts the book with intrigue and ends it with frankly NO resolution - by design, and succeeding (the character feels no resolution to the tale being told, and so we don't either; it was a fantastic choice on McCarthy's end).
Llewelyn Moss is a great character that is both entirely relatable and not at all, and it makes him fascinating to follow, including through the eyes of Sheriff Bell and a couple of other characters in the story. This character has all of my favorite..."normal" interactions, including a scene where the dialogue and the back-and-forth with another girl was just SO DAMN ENDEARING, I couldn't help but love these characters and hope for them.
Anton Chigurh...well, there's not enough I can say about this villain. SUCH. A. GOOD. VILLAIN. Chilling, cold, terrifying. Every scene he was in - especially when he interacted with other people - very nearly had me shaking in my boots. Like...I honestly can't say anything more than that. He's so fucking good. An all time favorite FOR SURE, and singlehandedly the reason why I - and surely thousands of others - have second-guessed our desire to deal with strangers, especially in customer-service job positions.
It's really hard to talk about one of the KEY reasons I consider giving NCFOM 5 stars: Chapter 9. If you know, you know. If you don't? You might have to read. I could always include the moment in a spoiler section here, but I won't. I will in the video review I do - probably eyeing a February 2024 release - but it was just so...yeah.
It was a gut-punch, and it completely changed how I thought of both this book and McCarthy as a whole.
While I came out of The Road never wanting to touch this author again, I came out of this one (which, I should say, I only started because a friend (hi, Alo!) recommended I try it with audio after he enjoyed it when he, like me, greatly disliked The Road, and then also disliked Blood Meridian)...anyway, I came out of this book WANTing to read more.
Friends have been doing a McCarthy readalong of sorts. The Road was in October (I led that one); Blood Meridian was in November (I skipped that one); No Country for Old Men is December (I nearly skipped this, started on a whim); and the Border Trilogy will be January, February, and March.
I am now thinking I will join along for those 3 books in the trilogy the same way I did with this: some combination of audiobook and immersive reading.
But when it comes right down to it...I can't quite give justice to this book with this review. I'm sure my rambling here has been a wreck. And while I did only rate it 4 stars...I would not argue with a 5-star rating, and mostly only pulled 1 star out of stubborn principle.
I honestly, legitimately, recommend this book to anybody looking to try out McCarthy. It was absolutely worth it, and I'm very glad I gave this an honest shot.