“Here beyond the men’s judgements all covenants were brittle.”

“Their talk when they talked was of witches or worse and always they sought to parcel from the darkness some voice or cry from among the cries that was no right beast.”

“Tethered to the polestar they rode the Dipper round while Orion rose in the southwest like a great electric kite.”

“Seated tailorwise in the eye of that cratered waste he watched the world tend away at the edges to a shimmering surmise that ringed the desert round.”

“That great corpus enshadowed him from all beyond.”

Blood Meridian is a cryptic and dark western novel by the writer of The Road, Cormac McCarthy. It is written from the perspective of an objective observer recounting the events of a group of ruthless men who travel the western plains hunting native Americans and brutalizing anyone in their path. The “main” character is called the Kid, but he isn't focused on for great swathes of the narrative. A hairless man named The Judge and a killer named John Glanton lead this gang in a search for bloody treasures. They and the men they lead are violent and corrupt. This book is not for the squeamish or sensitive. The men engage in grotesque and terrible things, and there are no heroes.

Blood Meridian takes place in the mid 1800s and illustrates the darkest capacities of unchecked men who think “might makes right”. The narrator doesn't add much in the way of moral judgement; instead, they explain the actions and describe the environment in a way that is both poetic and anachronistic. He uses period-specific words and phrases that are sometimes indecipherable even in context. The text’s opacity matched the dark, chaotic tone of the plot. I found myself barreling forward without fully knowing what was happening but with a certainty that whatever it was, it wasn't good.

This book wasn’t easy to read, but there were moments when I couldn’t stop myself from marveling at the exquisite prose. Cormac McCarthy is a wholly unique author who exemplifies the artistic nature of literature. It’s as if he paints with only black and white, but somehow the painting is as vivid as any colorful masterpiece. It is dark and terrible but intensely intimate and arresting.

I do not recommend this book to anyone interested in a “good time”. It is not fun or satisfying. It offers a view from above where the observer can only witness the dark truths of man’s depravity. Greed, rage, lust, pride, and will collide in this relentlessly macabre opus.

Click this image to buy this book today!

Book Review: The Road by Cormac McCarthy

https://joesnotesblog.com/blog/book-review-the-road-by-cormac-mccarthy