To me, The Road is not simply child and father wandering about a dark, cold, wilderness that lacks both food and humanity. I see a life that the father took for granted, and a life the son will never have. Morbid as this sounds, it has helped me to appreciate my own position in life at the moment. And, to the disgust of some, I commented that every time I read this book, I have to eat. I don't find the violence and descriptions appetizing, I'm not an animal. But every time the father observes the thinness of his son (which is very frequently) I find it hard to say no to a half peanut butter sandwich, because I don't ever want to feel like the characters do in this book. I think that this is the most effective form of writing. Even if the style is a little sketchy, if the reader feels uncomfrotable or empathy for the characters, it's working. McCarthy does this very well in The Road.
The writing style seemed to bother some people. McCarthy doesn't use the proper grammar we are all used to- apostrophes when necessary, for example -and this kind of irked me as well. However I want to open my mind to this book and any ideas it might provoke. What if this writing style is used to represent the non-existence of education anymore? The boy was born into this type of world, maybe he doesn't know about grammar. Maybe the writing style is more to convey a sense of hopelessness; it's simplistic and is written in a stream of conciousness format.
I'm not sure. Even though I have read this book already, I'm still excited to get to the end.
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