Wow, all I can say is WOW! I actually finished this book over a week ago, but I had to take a step back from it. This was one of the most raw and intense stories I have ever read. It's the story of a father and son after a horrible world-wide disaster. We never learn exactly what it was, but the description of the day suggests a nuclear event. We travel with this family, who we only ever know as "the man" and "the boy". We witness their day-to-day struggle just to continue to exist. The man has set a goal of going south, to the sea. The weather is getting colder and colder, and they will not be able to survive another winter in the north.
The book is written in the third person, but I couldn't help to feel like the man was speaking to us directly in the story. The center focus of the book is the relationship between the father and son, when we do run into other people they pose a danger to the main characters. There is a starkness about the descriptions and even the conversations between the two. McCarthy chooses to not use punctuation most of the time. I think that this really emphasizes the lack of society, and contributes to the harried feeling of the story. McCarthy's writing in this story invokes lots of emotion from the readers, but also requires the readers to draw their own conclusions.
There are so many scenes in this book that struck me, and that I'd like to share. However, I feel that doing so out of context would steal something from your experience of the book. There are parts of it that were so overwhelming, that I still tear up or feel jittery thinking about them.
