Enlightening Ignorance

Try to imagine for a moment, waking up to a world that is no longer safe to exist in. A world where your chances of surviving a full 24 hours is less likely than being gutted, cooked, and feasted on by starving cannibals. A world where all humanity has either perished, or transformed into a desperately dark entity forced into making survival the ultimate priority. Well; that world is the backdrop of Cormac McCarthy’s Pulitzer Prize winner masterpiece. I thought McCarthy was a magician of creating emotionally gripping fiction after reading “All the Pretty Horses,” and this novel vindicated that thought. McCarthy’s unique style of story telling definitely throws him into any discussion involving the literary powerhouses of fiction.

The Road is a somber tale of a father and son fighting to survive in a post apocalyptic-like situation. With limited food supply and the constant threat of being cannibalized, or falling victim to the wrath of mother nature; they navigate an ash covered country in hopes of making it to the coast where they hope relief is available. McCarthy has an uncanny ability to pull readers so deep into his fiction that identical emotions are shared by reader and character, in the face of tragic and devastating life experiences. Heart wrenching scenes are a staple of the McCarthy story and this novel has an excess of them. You will read this novel in anticipation of the-end-game from beginning to end. If you are not familiar with Cormac McCarthy’s work this novel will make you an instant fanatic. After No Country for Old Men took home the Oscar for Best Picture in 2008, we have the film representation of this novel to look forward to in the fall, and I have no doubt that this novel will make an equally magnificent film. Read this book!

This novel will assuredly serve as a representation of 21st century American literature at it’s finest. By winning the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2004; Edward P. Jones has joined the short, but nonetheless distinguished list of African American authors to win the Pulitzer for fiction.

This novel is a very thoughtful and meticulous exploration of a usually neglected aspect of slavery in America; the black slave owner. Being an African American man myself, with a less than modest knowledge of American Slavery; it was not until after reading this novel that I realized; many freed slaves actually developed the means to acquire slaves themselves, and sometimes did. A fact that seems to not play a major role in the history books regarding American slavery in the 18th and 19th century.

Best known for his short story collections, Jones uses many different character points of view to tell a poignant tale of the devastation caused by slavery, as well as the incomparable triumph experience by those who conquered it. He manages to simultaneously depict the struggles of both freed blacks and slaves, as they tried to survive in a time where few laws protected what little rights they had. I highly recommend this novel for anyone looking for a story elaborate enough in detail as to arose emotions that will last long after the final words are read.