Literary Award Winners Fiction Book Club discussion

Please discuss The Road through to the end in this thread.

Well, I finished this one very quickly. Here is what I posted for my review of it.

A man and his young son travel through a desolate, violent post-apocalyptic world. The reader is never told the cause of the decimation, but I was given the impression of a catastrophic explosion, most likely that of an enormous thesaurus factory. Read aloud, the phrasing had the cadence of poetry which vividly evoked the desolation. But, that poetic style became a window between me and the world of the story, enhancing my vision, but preventing me from entering. I regret this distance because the love and care between the two was a thing of true beauty in this otherwise harsh landscape.




It certainly was a poetic read. I understand why it was a literary award winner. But, sometimes such artistic prose can become a barrior for my entering fully into the story. I felt as if I was supposed to admire this one, not engage it.

So, was the ending supposed to evoke Adam & Eve in a new Garden of Eden?

A question for those who are reading The Road for this month's read:

How does the end of the book change the reader's perspective of the father?

I read The Road a few years ago and I remember it as a book that affected me emotionally rather than mentally, like the books I normally read do. I felt nauseated, horrified, scared and anxious but I couldn't put it down because I cared for the characters and wanted them to be alright.
I believe that McCarthy's writing style had a lot to do with creating that atmosphere. It was a horrible experience but I gave it 5 stars.

Spoiler Warning

Taide, I had the opposite response to the book. It engaged me mentally, but not emotionally. The literary style, while lovely and technically strong, drew too much of my attention so that it stood between me and the narrative, between me and the characters. I never felt much about the horrid situation, the devistated world. I stood in admiration of the quality of the prose, but was never engaged in the plot.


As for the question about the ending changing my impression of the father, I can't say it did, however, the ending did raise questions. The father was passionately determined to see his son survive at all costs. He would kill anyone who could possibly be a threat to that. He even sacrificed himself for the boy. The father's obvious desparate love for his son stood in sharp contrast with his callas treatment of all other humans, something that grew to unnecessary cruelty as the story went on. Whereas he would have allowed the soldier to live had he not threatened them early in the book, by the end he strips the old man of his rag covering, dooming him to die of the elements even though he could not use those rags. The father is courageous in just about every situation except when courage would be manifest by compassion toward another. The boy is the opposite, fearful before empty buildings and unfamiliar settings, but demonstrating a remarkable courage born of compassion in the face of other people.

Was the ending supposed to be a new Eden? the hope of creation and humanity beginning again? If that man and woman came for the boy immediately after his father's death, I had to wonder how long they had been proximate to the father and boy. Had they been observing the two for sometime, did the father know of their presence, but was too distrustful to make the connection? Did the father's fear make their existance more perilous than it needed to be? If they rescued the newly orphaned boy, who else did gthey rescue? And, how did that boy retain such compassion and trust toward other people when his only human interaction, his sole care taker an only hope of life, made his terror of people so clear?

Yes, I agree that the end raises a lot of questions. The boy is going to grow up in a world where the rules, the values and principles may have changed completely, so we don't know what will become of humanity.

I've read it few years ago, but still it's a benchmark for every dystopian novel I read. The strict, dry language, very typical for McCarthy, was something that fitted so perfectly to that abandoned landscape creating hunting, terrifying atmosphere, that I had problems with putting that book down.
It was my fist McCarthy, and because of that I was a very surprised reading his other novels to discover that it's not his usual genre.

Regarding Iren's observations, I had similar questions and found it a bit vaguely, to say at least, explained in terms of boys experience, why would he suddenly trust other people, but as I remember it was the father that convinced him to go with those, right? Therefore I remember that I decided to accept the fact that he trusted in him so much that it assured him no harm will come from them.

The boy was trusting throughout the novel. Every time they come across a lone traveler, he begs his father to help that person. After each refusal by the father, there is a dialogue in which the father begs the boy to talk to him again. Although the boy knows that there are "bad guys", he assumes the best about anyone they encounter and seems to feel responsible for anyone who appears to be in need. His empathy is very high. The father, of course, trusts no one.

Hi All. This is my first post in this group.

I had a similar reaction as Irene did to this book insofar as I was mentally engaged but not emotionally so. I enjoyed the prose and the narrator of this audio book was superb, but I did not find this story good enough to keep me engaged throughout. For me there were interesting sections but mostly I felt the story dragged on too long.

I'm hoping next month's book is more engaging.

I thought The Road was amazing. It's one of the best books I've read in a long time;spare, poetic and perfect. A novel about the love of a father for his child in a destroyed world.

The father is wary and, though at times he can be harsh and and even brutal, his job is to protect his child at all costs, but he always listened to his child's concerns and would think through and act on his child's desire to be kind and show mercy when he felt the risk was manageable.

I did think the ending might have been better with more of a transition. I think the people waiting in the wings to take the child represented a prophetic closure. McCarthy did tell us again and again that the father and son "carried the fire" and that they were some of the "good guys".

I've finished. I found it very moving but at points I didn't want to read it because it was a bit predictable insofar as you knew nothing good could happen to them. I'm glad that nothing extremely terrible happened until the end but I think the father, knowing what he knew, could have prepared his son a little better for survival after the inevitable happened.

Lovely story. I'm glad I read it. I see why it won the Pulitzer but I can't read it again. I know there is a movie adaptation but I know I can't watch it.

Many books and films have reminded me of this book since finishing it. The ending is definitely hopeful, almost anachronistically so. The ending imagery leaves you feeling that though you have experienced so much pain and hopelessness throughout, even in the desolate ravages of our apocalypse, there can be a good force out there.

I've read this book now for a second time, and I still find it a heartbreaking, beautiful, chilling, moving read. It is one of my favorite books. The lasting thought it left me with, was the utter tenacity of the human will to survive, at all costs, against all odds. Also the immovable bond between parent and child. Any parent would know that you would do absolutely anything for your child. I supposed we are programmed this way to ensure humanity's survival.

The post-apocalytic / dystopian genre is becoming very popular, I would think as a commentary to current environmental and other global changes and threats. This book is probably one of the main and first books in the genre. I see many people mentioned Margaret Atwood's writing that can also fall into this category. The 2015 Arthur C. Clarke winner, Station Eleven is also to be recommended, if you like the genre.

I've read this maybe seven, eight years ago so I find it refreshing to read everyone's comments. I'm surprised that a lot of people felt emotionally detached because I feel that this is a book that elicits an emotional response more than a cerebral one. The only mental exercise for me is the ending, which I found a bit off-key. I still don't get it and it could have been better for me if those last bits were edited out.