Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West by Cormac McCarthyMy rating: 2 of 5 stars
This is a 2-star review which is a fair estimate of my engagement with the work.
I can't recall why I bought this book other than I was reading comments about Cormac McCarthy and this book was mentioned as something worth reading.
It didn't work for me.
It is set in the mid-1800s with the conflict between the US and Mexico. There are no heroes - including the first nations people. The characters seem to move from one desert location to another where they either end up killing a bunch of locals, or being stuck in the hoosegow for a while before being released to go kill a bunch of other locals in another desert location.
The book works hard to be "literary" to the point of boredom with extended descriptions of desert, mountains, and villages that end up being repetitious given that the region does not possess a wealth of diverse biological zones. The author also eschews the use of quotation marks to delineate when a character speaks. The lack of quotation marks isn't a deal killer, but it did make the book a more challenging read.
I made it 25% through the book before Dorothy Parker's putative ghost arrived. Go read something better.
This review made me laugh. He finished the book and nails the writing style in his review 100%. If the writing style of the review doesn't work for you, then the book won't work for you either.
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