Blood Meridian

I have wanted to read Blood Meridian for a very long time, and now that my local library is a part of the One Card Network, I was finally able to get a hold of the book without buying it. I'm going through a bit of a Cormac McCarthy phase at the moment after recently reading The Road for our work book club. I think he's a fantastic writer.

Blood Meridian can be a little bit of a difficult read at times. Most people have a problem with the level of violence in it, which I must say is quite extreme, but I think I am a little de-sensitised, so although some of the imagery is quite shocking, that's not actually what made this difficult for me to read.

I actually struggled with some of the language. There were a heap of words I'd never heard of before, and I have to admit I'm not one of those readers who keeps a dictionary nearby for those occasions so I tried to figure out the sense of what he was trying to say myself. There's also a little Spanish used throughout and although it isn't essential to know every piece of dialogue, it took me out of the story when it got to those parts. And my final complaint was the writing style, I suppose used to convey the intensity of certain scenes, was a little tiresome, particularly when it came to a sentence that just wouldn't end.

However, all that said, it's a great, if difficult to read story, and is confronting. I'm still loving Cormac McCarthy and have to admit to being impressed with how drastically he can change his style to suit the novel. It's a massive difference from The Road to this. The last 50 pages or so in particular were really gripping.

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy - 3.5 stars.



Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy