Reading The Road

It's summer. Or at least the calendar says it's summer. So far the weather hasn't really been able to catch up...I think we've had something like 15 straight days of greyness!

Yesterday I started reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy. In my old age I seem to cry a lot. When I was 20 I never cried. I was embarrassed by people who did. I remember once going to a movie in college with a guy and he cried at the end of Saving Private Ryan and I thought, "What a baby!" and promptly broke up with him. But times have changed since then. Now I cry at the drop of a hat. Which brings me back to The Road. My roommate Andy and my friend Jeremy have told me numerous times since the book was released that I should read it. So two days ago when I realized I've read every book at least twice in my bookcase, I picked up Andy's copy and started reading...and didn't put it down until 10 hours later when I was sobbing at the end.

The book takes place in a post apocalyptic world and follows a father and son as they journey to the sea. McCarthy's writing is hard to explain, but I would argue he is in many ways the successor to Faulkner. Emotional, descriptive and dialogue that has no quotations, so the father and son's conversations seem to easily flow into the other. I am not a fan of post-apocalyptic stories. But the sense of loss--of a world and of hope--and the redemptive power of love between a father and son is truly moving. That last line was the cheesiest thing I've ever written. Which is why you should ignore me and read the book.

Which brings me back to my original thought...while I found the book deeply moving and recommend it without reservation, reading The Road, a book that takes place in a cloudy grey sunless world without hope, might not be the best book to read when you're living in the cold grey world of New York. And maybe I'm not a sap at all--just moody from the weather...