• This topic has 72 replies, 35 voices, and was last updated 10 years ago by DezB.
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  • Just finished reading 'the road'…
  • flange
    Free Member

    …in one sitting. Bloody hell what a book. I’ve downloaded the film but haven’t watched yet, I’m worried it’ll ruin the book for me.

    Anyway, if you’ve not read it, I thoroughly recommend it.

    mikey74
    Free Member

    The film does the book justice quite well. They are both probably the most moving pieces of either art form I have ever encountered: If you don’t tear-up or cry at the end you have a heart of stone.

    boxelder
    Full Member

    The ending in the film holds a lot less uncertainty……

    A bit like in ‘No country……’, where HE wipes blood from his boot after visiting the wife – reading it I believed he couldn’t kill her, as she wouldn’t call the coin.

    Have you read Suttree o Blood Meridian?

    Among the best living authors without any doubt.

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    flange
    Free Member

    I haven’t but now off to download – good call

    Also managed to download the screenplay for the counsellor which makes for bloody hard reading..

    mikey74
    Free Member

    From what I remember, the ending to the novel is fairly certain, but I may be mistaken. Blood Meridian is, IMO, one of the greatest novels ever.

    I have never read Suttree though. Hmmmmm, what have I read by him:

    No Country for Old Men
    Blood Meridian
    Child of God
    The Outer Darkness
    The Road.

    I started the Border Trilogy but didn’t really get that far to be honest.

    brakes
    Free Member

    my favourite book. thankfully I read it before I became a father – I think I’d still be blubbing now if I had read it later.
    a story of hope where there is no hope.

    film is great too and does well to portray the pace and mood of the book, but it can’t match the way the book leaves you emotionally wrecked and makes you question the futility of your own existence, but somehow in a good way…
    It helps that Viggo Mortensen is dreamy.

    mikey74
    Free Member

    It is certainly one of those books that leaves an indelible mark.

    It helps that Viggo Mortensen is dreamy.

    I’d say it’s because he’s a great actor 😀

    LimboJimbo
    Full Member

    my favourite book. thankfully I read it before I became a father

    I can’t read it now for exactly that reason. Beautiful but very bleak.

    moonsaballoon
    Full Member

    Loved both the book and the film . Am currently reading blood meridian but to be honest am finding it quite hard work .

    MrGreedy
    Full Member

    Very similar experience here – finished it at 3am, exhausted and blubbing. Have got a copy of the film in the house but have put off watching it for exactly the same reason. I don’t think any other piece of art has affected me that deeply, so it would be a big ask for the film to come up to that level too. I might have to re-read the book before crossing that rubicon.

    mikey74
    Free Member

    Blood Meridian IS hard work, but very worth it.

    righog
    Free Member

    I am not eloquent enough to express my feelings about, The Road. For me it was a physical as well as just a reading experience. I was with them, fighting for them all the way through the book ( I am a Father to a boy the same age at the time of reading).

    Of course I recommended it to friends, the men who read it all thought the same as me, however the women who read it did not have the same feeling for it at all.

    The Film was a great representation of the book and a great film, however nowhere near the experience of reading the book.

    torsoinalake
    Free Member

    a story of hope where there is no hope

    McCarthy doesn’t do hope. His books are unrelentingly bleak. We are all dying and evil prevails, is his message.

    righog
    Free Member

    Torso in a Lake….When I read it, I was supplying the Hope, very clever of Macarthy I thought 😀

    piemonster
    Full Member

    I’ve only watched the film, didn’t leave me ever wanting to watch the book.

    I’m sure it’s great, but I’d rather not enter depression voluntarily.

    sc-xc
    Full Member

    – I didn’t like the book, said the boy

    – why? Said the man

    – cos it was a load of shit, said the boy.

    righog
    Free Member

    – I didn’t like the book, said the boy

    – why? Said the man

    – cos it was a load of shit, said the boy.

    – You will understand it better, when you grow to be a man, said the man.

    brakes
    Free Member

    There is always hope.

    Torso in a Lake….When I read it, I was supplying the Hope, very clever of Macarthy I though

    Never thought of it like that. Brings a new depth to the book.

    mikey74
    Free Member

    McCarthy doesn’t do hope. His books are unrelentingly bleak. We are all dying and evil prevails, is his message.

    Look deeper.

    oldboy
    Free Member

    His Border Trilogy and Blood Meridian are my favorites. The Road was a little too disturbing.

    oldboy
    Free Member

    Double post – phone acting up!

    noteeth
    Free Member

    Suttree and The Crossing are my personal favourites. An amazing writer.

    lordmerchant
    Free Member

    LOVE the apocalyptic genre…books, movies, games you name it.
    Just could not get away with the prose in the road, keep meaning to go back and try it but never get around. If you want a truly awesome apocalyptic book checj out the stand by Stephen King or Swan song by Robert R. McCammon.

    grievoustim
    Free Member

    I think there is much hope in McCarthy

    The worlds he’s writing about, whether its the old west, present day, or apocalyptic near future is always populated with terrifying brutality and evil. But the good always survives too.

    The film of the road is good – just don’t watch the film of “All the pretty horses”

    flange
    Free Member

    Cheers lordmerchant – will have a look at those two

    deadlydarcy
    Free Member

    An amazing writer.

    +lots

    Ro5ey
    Free Member

    Sadly l saw the film first… Which genuinely terrified me…. So the book lost it’s impact, saying that the pair of them took their toil on me so to speak…. That was about a year ago I might have “recovered” now to give it another read.

    djflexure
    Full Member

    Loved the Border Trilogy, one of my favourites, but could not get on with The Road. I’m probably a sucker for more of a back to nature feel rather than post apocalyptic nihilism.

    oldboy
    Free Member

    Good thread, makes a change from the usual “Which is your favourite James Bond villain” moronic trash!

    fasthaggis
    Full Member

    What a book.

    It was as grim as a grim thing ,with extra bleak.
    Glad that I read it in the Summer months 😯

    futonrivercrossing
    Free Member

    Preferred the Border Trilogy – this one was just bleak, with added bleak, with side order extra hot bleak, wrapped in a sandwich of pared down dialogue masquerading as profundity 😉 nice and short though, which is a plus!

    oldboy
    Free Member

    Looks like The Border Trilogy is coming out on top here. Thanks for the timely reminder, I must read the books again.

    scaredypants
    Full Member

    I’ve only read the road and blood meridian (both after recommendations on here quite a while ago)

    in order of reading:

    IMO The Road was fantastic – bleakly, unremittingly grim and a hard but great one-shot read (my kids were about the “right” age at the time, too)

    By contrast, I thought Blood Meridian was a big letdown – same rich language but something wasn’t right; felt ostentatious or something
    (I’m reluctant to read any more in case they are too, so I’m giving it a few years off)

    molgrips
    Free Member

    Is this the book of which The Last of Us is a computer game version? I have the game, not opened it yet. Not seen or read any other form tho.

    flange
    Free Member

    What a book.

    It was as grim as a grim thing ,with extra bleak.
    Glad that I read it in the Summer months

    Very true, stood outside afterwards last night and everything just felt that little bit colder..makes me think twice about winter bike packing. Or maybe I should in preparation

    wordnumb
    Free Member

    – I didn’t like the book, said the bleak boy

    – why? Said the man, bleakly

    – cos it was a bleaking load of shit, said the boy.

    righog
    Free Member

    It was as grim as a grim thing ,with extra bleak.

    Kind of, but I will remember it as a love story ( between a Father and a son ) more than anything else.

    boxelder
    Full Member

    If you liked the Border Trilogy……….don’t watch the film of All the pretty horses.

    Read Edgar Allan Poes ‘Fall of the house of Usher’ instead.

    pedropete
    Full Member

    For me Cormack McCarthy’s writing is utterly compelling. At first very hard to get into with unusual dialogue, but once you catch the rhythm his work is totally absorbing & I’ve never been so moved by any other author. You usually need to read something light after, though…

    Northwind
    Full Member

    I thought it was awful tbh. Some good points- I love the sheer bleakness of it and the fact that he didn’t feel like he had to explain it all, too many post-apocalyptic stories are obsessed with the pre-… but once you realise that they’re basically in a tunnel shooter it gets dull. They’re starving but every time they run out of food they find some, every time the plot requires a crisis it immediately happens, and there are actual end of level bosses. Oh and then it just stops.

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