Oprah's New Book Club Pick: McCarthy's The Road

"It's the father-son journey you'll never forget."

Hah! That's putting it mildly. But yeah, surprising pick.

Yeah, I saw that. It seems for every five shitty books about a woman trying to figure out her place in the world or an ordinary man overcoming his addiction, she'll actually pick a book worth reading, like East of Eden, or her Summer 'O Faulkner or this one.

Damn, I've read a lot of Oprah books. I don't know how I feel about that.

I really want to read this, but have been waiting for a more affordable paperback edition. Hopefully they'll have one soon.

You know what? There's a paperback Oprah edition. Hot damn!

Borders usually has the book club selection at a reduced price, so there's hope for you, Joe. This is a very interesting choice, I agree. I hope that whomever recommended this title to "O" gets a raise.

Edit: Sorry 'bout the late info, Joe.

She also picked some Rohinton Mistry awhile back.

Does this mean McCarthy's going to be on the show? If so, it'll be the first episode I watch since Andrew Vachss was on like 10 years ago.

Yep, he's scheduled. Poitier, Mendela, Rock... none escape Oprah's embrace.

I want to read this so bad. Isn't John Hillcoat attached to direct it?

As if I wasn't conflicted enough over Oprah's Book Club as it is...


The only solid statement I can really say is that The Road is superb.

Oprah? Book Club? McCarthy?
....I dunno.

Say what you will about Oprah and her Menstruating Army, The Road is a damn fine read.

I'm just wondering if this'll help or hinder the book's chances come Pulitzer time. (It's loong been a front-runner.) I also feel a weird nausea for the publisher. Sure, they get an insane sales boost, but the rushed paperback edition seems kind of irritating given that they usually try to let the HC sell a bit more. I mean, this was actually selling pretty well before. Still, my hat's off to McCarthy for giving in and not pulling a Franzen. (The Corrections was overrated garbage anyway.)

The only thing that pisses me off about this is that I've had the book since Christmas, and haven't found the time to sit down and read it yet.

The first person that asks me if I'm reading it because of Oprah's recommendation gets bopped on the head with my hardcover copy.

Target had half an endcap devoted to the book when I was there last night. Has a nice "Oprah's Book Club" mark and everything.

I agree. The book, while a dark, brutal, terrifying read, wound up surprisingly optimistic about the boy's fate. I wonder if it had been chosen if that were not the case. Anyhow, a worthy choice.

I hope Oprah dies.

I'm halfway through The Road, and enjoying it a lot, but this Oprah Book Club thing almost makes me want to throw it away. The thought that I'm reading the same book as some weepy Oprah-watching housewife makes me want to throw up.

It's really not THAT optimistic. It's more like he (SWIPE) survived childhood and must now go live in this world without his father. Nothing improved for him.

What interests me about this choice is most critics seeme to agree that the brief portrayal of the wife is it's achille's heel. I wonder how Oprah's club will interpret her. Cause from what I hear, a lot of women watch Oprah.

I didn't have the problem with the wife myself. Some of my favourite passages involve her, especially the description of the Event - he turns on the bathtub, she is nonplussed.

I finished it last night.

An epic of two people and nothingness that grows more disturbing as the scope increases. Ruthless in its' vocabulary: bleak, constant, simple. The final fifty pages have put me in a daze. It feels like the final word on the "post-apocalypse" genre, at least until someone outwrites Cormac McCarthy. I'm not holding my breath.

If you haven't read it, I'd pick up some of the authors' other work before jumping in. Beginning THE ROAD knowing McCarthy's love of nature and terrain description helps take the tragedy to another level in comparing the vivid landscapes of his previous work with the uncompromising slow, gray crawl of the future.

Oprah's Book Club? Fine by me. Anything to sell a good book. HOWEVER:

A film adaptation, even by a director with the chops, strikes me as a seriously misguided effort. Unless they keep the baby stuff.

LOVE THIS BOOK.

Yeah, I ordered this book from Amazon earlier in the week because I was a couple dollars shy of reaching Super Saving Shipping! I new I wouldn't have time to read it for a couple of months at least, but I figured I wanted it at some point.

Then it shows up this week with a little Oprah sticker on it. Whodathunkit?

Sort of under the radar with everything going on today, but...

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/04/1....ap/index.html

Just finished this a few minutes ago...to pull a Nunziata, this book DESTROYED me. I'm in the middle of reading a few other books right now, but I blew through this is what seemed like a few hours. Fantastic read.

First episode of Oprah I'll have watched since Andrew Vachss was on 10 years ago.

I felt like I slipped into a Bizzaro universe this morning when I called my wife from work to make sure the DVR was set for this.

I'm about halfway through this and it's simply brilliant. I've never read anything more terrifying.

Last McCarthy book I read was All the Pretty Horses in college. I absolutely need to read more of his stuff.

Just finished this. Took me a couple months to get through because I tell myself I'm busy. I figured that would hurt the read for me but man... I teared up a little when I got to the end. I didn't even realize how attached I was.

Bump, can't find the other thread related to The Road.

I'm thinking I might have to read this one again before the movie comes out. I think I flew through it in a week the first time out. Seriously, I couldn't put it down. Despite how unrelentingly bleak it is, it's a fantastic read. Plus, that one little note of hope at the end makes the entire depressing journey a little easier to take in the long run, even if it is tinged with uncertainty.

Yeah, I blew through it again during a flight to Texas and my mom got worried and asked me why I was so quiet for the first few hours of my visit. I just kept thinking about the fucking thing for at least a day. I really, really need to buy it.

Yeah, owning it is probably a wise idea. It's one of those books I can see myself grabbing off the shelf and reading every couple of years. My girlfriend's dad got me the hardcover for Christmas the year it came out. Simultaneously one of the best and most depressing gifts I have ever received.

In the film news thread some are talking about the book as if it is a continuous downer, and while it is bleak, the book isn't without it's "breather" moments, even discounting the end.

When the man and the boy are on the verge of starvation and looking for ANYTHING to give them a bit of sustenance reading the chapter where the man finds that food store in a cellar was quite a relief.

Also, the boy's outlook and innocence throughout underline that mankind need not be inherently evil. Even after being robbed, almost killed, and enduring their overall situation, he is still able to retain some innocence and awe. I think that is a perfect example of hope.

That section probably provided the most tension for me throughout the entire novel, as I kept waiting for something, ANYTHING to come along and take this one little oasis of sanity away from them. I was so afraid for the man and the boy during that entire section. This book just sucked me in and never let go.

For me the reason the book is such a continuous downer is being a dad, it would kill me to have to watch my child suffer like that. I would probably be the same way in trying to do anything to let him and teach him how to survive; but still you know your child is suffering is the most horrible thing in the world.

The book is great though.

With No Country for Old Men winning the Oscar, I'm not as afraid of the book having its ending changed to something happier, but I still have I Am Legend moving ending fears.

Casey has an interesting point about perspective. I read the book for the 1st time years ago, and then read it again recently after finding out my wife was pregnant. I found myself really punched hard by what the father had to be feeling throughout. He had his wife give up all hope, and then had so little control in the actually caring for his son’s well being. The weight of inevitability loomed so much more heavily from that perspective, when time and again humanity was shown to be basically gone.

I love some of the imagery in this book.

The bit where they see an 'army' march past them and each section is described is brilliant.


I think the book will lend itself very well to film, there are quite few set pieces that will generate a lot of tension

Just finished this one a couple of days ago, and really enjoyed it. Spoilers follow.

What do you guys make of the ending, though? I couldn't decide whether the last paragraph was just one last glimpse at a memory of the dead world, or something else. The last sentence in particular has me confounded, as I can't decide whether McCarthy is referring to the subject of the first sentence in the paragraph with the pronoun "they", or to the boy's new family.

I guess the reason for this is that the man (the new one) talks about how the boy needs to get away from the road, and the fact that, on the whole, the road itself runs through the remains of civilization which everyone so far has been scavenging from. The facts that the new man a) has children, and b) seems to be able to make his own shotgun shells, seem very important to me, in that the new man is in some way a maker, rather than simply a scavenger.

Was the road the source of the misery throughout the book? We see the man constantly clinging to the old civilization, and he is much more brutal than the boy, who has only known this wasted world. They also tread the same paths as the "bad guys," who are living off of the remains just as they are, just to a different degree, as they are also eating each other.

I guess I could go on (the fact that the blood cults started in the cities is an important detail, for example), but McCarthy seems to be saying something not only about fathers and sons, but about America. Is McCarthy criticizing our willingness to simply cannibalize rather than to willingly abandon and create anew?

What is that last paragraph? An old memory, or a new life away from the road?

This novel kicked my ass. The one thing I had to adjust to was the prose style of this book since there were no quotation marks or apostrphes. It was an interesting choice but it took some adjustment. I think the moment that got me was when the father found an old can of coke and gave it to his son. For some reason that scene was so tragic and sad. I was also on the edge of my seat waiting for them to find food and them running across that bomb shelter was amazingly well done. I never actually breathed a sigh of relief reading a novel but I did there. Great great book and I can't wait to see the movie. Viggo Mortenson stars which is a giant leap in the right direction. Here's hoping they keep it just as is. Wow, my ass has been kicked hard.