July book: The Road by Cormac McCarthychosen by Alana
Book Description:
"A father and his young son walk alone through burned America, heading slowly for the coast. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind.
They have nothing but a pistol to defend themselves against the men who stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food - and each other."
What we discussed about the book:
Everyone agreed it was pretty bleak, but not as gruesome as we had expected it to be.
Most of us thought the language was better than the story itself, but others found the language difficult.
We found the dialogue quite hard to follow, with many of the group commenting that often we had to trawl back up through the comments to figure out if it was the boy or the man talking.
The question of 'who was leading who' was raised...with many of us feeling the balance shifted at a point within the novel, from the man leading the boy, to the boy taking more responsibility.
The 'travelling' and trying to get to the coast gave them purpose, and we discussed that even though it was unlikely much would change if they eventually got there, if they had stayed where there were it was almost an acceptance that this was what life was, and there was nothing to look forward to.
We talked about how old we had pictured the boy - and it ranged between 6 and about 9 years.
Alana asked if we could imagine this happening easily - and a number of us said we could.
And then we were sidetracked into:
- The book brought up feelings and memories of September 11 - and we all talked about where we were when it happened, and how we felt.
- What would we do if we were in the same situation as in the book. Would you choose to go on, or would you give up? We discussed this, and most agreed it would depend on whether you had children or not, but even so, making the decision for the whole family to 'give up' would be incredibly difficult.
- Divorcing friends - when to do it, how to do it, and how to get over the guilt!
And in other news
Nothing much - it was a small bookclub (5 of us) and while we missed the others, we had a lovely time, and Alana put on some great food.
RatingsRatings average: 7
Ratings range: 6-8. 1xDNR
