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A review by joshkiba13
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
"Where men can't live, gods fare no better . . ."
This was my second post-apocalyptic type story after The Stand, and it was quite different than that. In The Road we solely follow a man and his son, nameless to us.
I liked how it was left ambiguous what happened to humanity and the earth, what the cause was of such desolation. And I think McCarthy did a good job having flashbacks every so often of the man's life before the world changed so. The pain he went through and goes through throughout the story for his son's protection is tender and gripping.
It was mostly travels and aims to survive with sudden and unexpected bursts of violence or horrific presentations of the grisly lengths that other people went to to survive. The contrast between the man and boy's understanding of the world always made for interesting dialogue, the boy not understanding why they couldn't help other people or be with them.
I 100% recommend the audiobook format of this book, as McCarthy doesn't use quotation marks for his dialogue, and what dialogue there is is very simple, short, and capped of with he said's, so it'd be hard to tell which character is talking without the narrator doing distinct voices. Tom Stechschulte was phenomenal as a narrator; his voice for the young boy wasn't cringy, and his voice for the father was deep, gutterly, and emotional.
In the end I'm left feeling like not a ton happened, but it leaves you with questions to ponder and such. Descriptions of the landscape were often beautiful, and every once in a while we'd get a quote about humanity and hope that we're great, such as the one I opened with.
This was my second post-apocalyptic type story after The Stand, and it was quite different than that. In The Road we solely follow a man and his son, nameless to us.
I liked how it was left ambiguous what happened to humanity and the earth, what the cause was of such desolation. And I think McCarthy did a good job having flashbacks every so often of the man's life before the world changed so. The pain he went through and goes through throughout the story for his son's protection is tender and gripping.
It was mostly travels and aims to survive with sudden and unexpected bursts of violence or horrific presentations of the grisly lengths that other people went to to survive. The contrast between the man and boy's understanding of the world always made for interesting dialogue, the boy not understanding why they couldn't help other people or be with them.
I 100% recommend the audiobook format of this book, as McCarthy doesn't use quotation marks for his dialogue, and what dialogue there is is very simple, short, and capped of with he said's, so it'd be hard to tell which character is talking without the narrator doing distinct voices. Tom Stechschulte was phenomenal as a narrator; his voice for the young boy wasn't cringy, and his voice for the father was deep, gutterly, and emotional.
In the end I'm left feeling like not a ton happened, but it leaves you with questions to ponder and such. Descriptions of the landscape were often beautiful, and every once in a while we'd get a quote about humanity and hope that we're great, such as the one I opened with.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Blood, Violence, and Cannibalism
Minor: Death of parent