The Road

By: Cormac McCarthy

Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte

Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's summary

Pulitzer Prize, Fiction, 2007

America is a barren landscape of smoldering ashes, devoid of life except for those people still struggling to scratch out some type of existence. Amidst this destruction, a father and his young son walk, always toward the coast, but with no real understanding that circumstances will improve once they arrive. Still, they persevere, and their relationship comes to represent goodness in a world of utter devastation.

Bleak but brilliant, with glimmers of hope and humor, The Road is a stunning allegory and perhaps Cormac McCarthy's finest novel to date. This remarkable departure from his previous works has been hailed by Kirkus Reviews as a "novel of horrific beauty, where death is the only truth".

McCarthy, a New York Times best-selling author, is a past recipient of the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award. He is widely considered one of America's greatest writers.

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Critic reviews

"McCarthy's prose retains its ability to seduce...and there are nods to the gentler aspects of the human spirit." (The New Yorker)
"One of McCarthy's best novels, probably his most moving and perhaps his most personal...Every moment of The Road is rich with dilemmas that are as shattering as they are unspoken...McCarthy is so accomplished that the reader senses the mysterious and intuitive changes between father and son that can't be articulated, let alone dramatized...Both lyric and savage, both desperate and transcendent, although transcendence is singed around the edges...Tag McCarthy one of the four or five great American novelists of his generation." (Los Angeles Times Book Review)

Gut wrenching, heart breaking story

What did you love best about The Road?

Great visualization of the struggle.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Road?

There is a scene where they enter a house, but it's not just a house, and the basement door is locked. Could it be food . . .

Oustanding

This was my first Cormac McCarthy book and it well and truly sucked me in! The reading was excellent, and the story just flowed so well. The viion of a lost world was so believable. Highly recommended.

Waiting for Godot meets the Walking Dead

There are some incredibly beautiful passages in this book, but if you are someone who has read a lot of post-apocalyptic science fiction, very little in here will surprise you.

[I listened to this as an audio book read by Tom Stechschulte, who did an excellent job]

A very worthy recipient of the Pulitzer.

Another completely brilliant work by the master. One might think they’ve already read, heard, or seen enough books and films about a post-apocalyptic world. I thought I had. Leave it to Cormac McCarthy, however, to tell the tale better than it’s ever been told before. This was a tangible, heartbreaking, often terrifying journey. Truly brilliant story-telling.

Bleak, very bleak

A tough book to listen to, even with an excellent reader. Relentlessly bleak, particularly the first couple of hours, which will leave you depressed. It gets better, but not much. I admit the prose is extraordinary, and the conclusion stays with you. If you're looking for a downer, this is a book for you.

A world without God?

This is a great story of the human condition. The post apocalyptic world it which they live is very much how I imagine the world would be if there were no God. I recommend this book to everyone and the ready did a great job!

Interesting

This was a really different story plot. It was pretty well written and kept my interest. The narrator was good too. This seemed almost like a science fiction story really.

professional vivid narration.

Loved to listen. the narrator was great. however the story was good,but not the best of its kind. liked the "one second after" more.

Poetic but dark

The author writes with such a poetic style that this book is really interesting to listen to. The story is dark so it may not be everyone's cup of tea.

Narration was excellent.

Great Beauty and Great Sadness

Most audiobooks I'm impatient to get through, and listen to at 1.5x speed. Other books are so dense with emotion and prose, like Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance, that I listen to them at 0.8x speed. This was one of the latter. One of the saddest things I've ever read. The sense of desolation and hopeless is palpable.